432 



' U. x »■. 







ESTABLISHED 1875 



-0 F 



GfORGHONN^ 




MEMOIR AND LETTERS 



OF 



THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH 



TRINTED BV BALLANTYNE AND COMPANY 
EDINBURGH AND LONDON 



A MEMOIR 



OF THE 



REV. SYDNEY SMITH 

► i 

BY HIS DAUGHTER 

LADY HOLLAND 

WITH 

A SELECTION FROM HIS LETTERS 

EDITED BY 

MRS AUSTIN 



& $eb tifoittotr 



LONDON 
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 

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\gn-4- 



TRANSFER 
» O. PUBLIC LIBRAgJ 
SEPT. lO, 1 40 






THIS MEMOIR OF MY FATHER, 

THE PREPARATION FOR WHICH WAS THE CONSTANT 

OCCUPATION OF MY MOTHER'S LIFE, 

AND THE COMPLETION OF WHICH WAS THE MOST EARNEST 

OBJECT OF HER DESIRE, 

BOTH IN^H^^LlFE ANDj AT HER DEATH, 

WHICH NOTHING BUT HER EARNEST DESIRE COULD HAVE 

GIVEN ME COURAGE TO ATTEMPT, 

I NOW DEDICATE TO HER MEMORY, 

BELIEVING IT 

TO BE THE MOST GRATEFUL TRIBUTE I CAN OFFER 

ON HER GRAVE. 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 



Sydney Smith's Life : he who opens this book under the expec- 
tation of reading in it curious adventures, important transactions, 
or public events, had better close the volume, for none of these 
things will he find therein. 

Nothing can be more thoroughly private and eventless than the 
narrative I am about to give ; yet I feel myself, and I have reason 
to believe there are many who will feel with me, that this Life is 
not therefore uninteresting or unimportant : for, though circum- 
stances over which my father had no control forbade his taking 
that active share in the affairs of his country, for which his talents 
and his character so eminently fitted him, yet neither circumstances 
nor power could suppress these talents, or subdue and enfeeble 
that character ; and I believe I may assert, without danger of con- 
tradiction, that by them, and the use he has made of them, he has 
earned for himself a place amongst the great men of his time and 
country. 

Such being the case, however, his talents, and the employment 
of them, are alone before the world. This is but half the picture ; 
and these very talents, and the use he has made of them, make me 
believe that few who have known so much do not wish to know more. 

The mode of life, the heart, the habits, the thoughts and feelings, 
the conversation, the home, the occupations of such a man, — all, 
in short, which can give life and reality to the picture, — are as yet 
wanting ; and it is to endeavour to supply this want that I have 
ventured to undertake this task. 

It is always more difficult to write the life of a private than of a 
public man. There are many things likewise which make that of 
my father a peculiarly difficult one to delineate; and I should 
shrink from the task I have undertaken, from the fear of not doing 
it justice, had not death made such fearful havoc amongst his 
early contemporaries, and those best fitted to do justice to his 
memory ; and age, business, or health, placed insuperable obstacles 
in the way of all those abler pens which both my mother and I had 
once hoped might undertake it. 



viii A UTHOR >S PREFA CE. 

I therefore, from these causes, and in accordance with my 
mother's most earnest desire, repeated in her will, that some record 
of his virtues should be written, venture to give to the public these 
recollections of my father, which I had previously been collecting 
for some years solely for myself and my children, together with 
numerous contributions from various friends. 

With these materials, illustrating the selection of his letters, 
which my friend Mrs Austin has kindly undertaken to edit, I trust 
to lay before the public such a record of my father's character, as 
a son, a clergyman, a father, a husband, and a friend, as may be 
deemed by them not unworthy of the reputation he has already 
acquired for talent and honesty by his writings. 

If I succeed, I shall have accomplished the object I have most 
at heart. If I fail, I trust that with many my motive will be some 
excuse ; and that they will attribute it to the inability and inex- 
perience of his advocate, and not to the weakness of the cause. 

In giving these annals of my father's life, the object has been, as 
much as possible, to make him speak for himself, even where (as 
in some few instances) a portion of them have already appeared 
before the public ; as these extracts serve to weave together the 
rest of the narrative, and are of course far better than anything I 
could put in their place. 

The points which can alone justify the publication of these re- 
collections and letters are, that they shall neither hurt the living, 
injure the dead, nor impair the reputation of their author. These 
objects we have endeavoured most strenuously to keep in view. 
There is little in the whole work that could give pain, even if every 
particular were understood. Most of the persons alluded to have 
been long since dead, and the allusions forgotten. Yet, should 
there be, in either the letters or the narrative, any anecdote acci- 
dentally preserved which may meet the eye of those who, from 
intimacy with him, or from having been present at the scene 
described, could lift the veil that has been purposely thrown over it, 
let me here entreat them, if they loved my father in life, and honour 
his memory in death, never, by their explanations, to make the pen 
of Sydney Smith do in death what it never did in life, — inflict un- 
deserved pain on any human being. 

I must add, with respect to the letters collected from various 
sources, that it is a remarkable fact, as testifying the estimation in 
which my father was held by his contemporaries, that there are 
among them many small notes merely containing some trifling 
message or an invitation to dinner ; things without the slightest 
merit or value in themselves, yet carefully folded up, dated, and 
preserved with the greatest care for years by those who had received 
them from him. This little trait speaks, I think, volumes. From 



A UTHOR 'S PRE FA CE. ix 

these letters Mrs Austin has. selected those most calculated to inter- 
est the reader, or in any way to illustrate my father's feelings and 
character, without special reference to their talent only. 

It will be seen in the narrative, and, in justice to my father, it 
ought not to be forgotten, that he entered the Church out of con- 
sideration for, and in obedience to, the wishes of his father ; and 
like his friend Dr Stanley, Bishop of Norwich, with a strong natural 
bias towards another profession ; so that, in his passage through 
life, he had often to exercise control over himself, and to make a 
struggle to do that which is comparatively easy to those who have 
embraced their profession from taste and inclination alone. 

But having entered the Church from a sense of duty, I think the 
narrative will show that he made duty his guide through life ; — 
that he honoured his profession, and was honoured in it by those 
who had the best opportunities of observing him ; — that, ever ready 
to perform its humblest duties, he gathered (as he says) from the 
study of the Bible, that the highest duty of a clergyman was to 
calm religious hatreds, and spread religious peace and toleration ; — 
that in this labour of love he exerted himself from early youth to 
the hour of his death ; — and that he dreaded, as the greatest of all 
evils, that the " golden chain," which he describes as " reaching 
from earth to heaven," should be injured either by fanaticism or 
scepticism. Thus, lending himself to no extremes and no party in 
the Church, he endeavoured through life to guard religion simple 
and pure, as we received it from the hand of God, and as it is 
taught in that Church to which he belonged. 

It now only remains for me to express my thanks to those wha 
have aided my task by their contributions, which I should gladly 
have done by name, had they not been too numerous. But it has 
been deeply gratifying to my feelings, and has given me courage to 
proceed, to find that all my father's oldest friends have been eager 
to assist me in my task, and have all, with very few exceptions, 
contributed something towards it. I trust they may not think I 
have misused their gifts, and, for the sake of the father, will receive 
with indulgence the efforts of his daughter to do fresh honour to 
his memory by chronicling his virtues. 



This slight sketch of my father's life has passed through the 
ordeal of his private friends, and has been pronounced by them to 
present a faithful picture of his habits and character. The subject 
of it is of course so deeply interesting to me, that I can form no 
estimate of what it may be to others ; but I am encouraged by 
these friends to believe that the life of an honest man honestly told, 



x A UTHOR 'S PRE FA CE. 

c^n never be without some value and interest to every one. In 
deference therefore to their opinions I now offer this Memoir to the 
public, with some additions and such corrections as I have been 
able to make ; though I fear there may still remain many errors as 
to time, inevitable in a narrative written (as this is chiefly) from 
memory, and with but few data to guide me. 

I do not however, I confess, offer this Memoir to the public with- 
out some anxiety ; not from the fear of any honest opposition to my 
father's opinions, or censure of the imperfect manner in which I may- 
have performed my task : these are of course open to criticism, and 
are fair and honourable objects of attack. But I am aware how 
easily the frank and fearless, because innocent, expressions of my 
father's conversation may be misunderstood and misrepresented, or 
the private feelings of my friends wounded, should there be any one 
ungenerous enough to do so. I will however trust that, as this 
Memoir has been written with the most earnest desire to tell the 
truth, but in doing so to avoid giving just cause of pain to any one, 
I shall meet with equal delicacy from the public ; and shall find 
that any angry feelings which the bold, undisguised expression of 
my father's opinions during life may have formerly excited in the 
world, have been long since forgotten, or are buried in the grave of 
him whose loss I (may I not rather say, we all ?) lament. 

S. H. 

London, May 1855. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

Birth and Family— Father— Profession— Marriage of Father— Mother— Sir Isaac 
Newton — School — Early Peculiarities — Talleyrand — College — Goes to Nor- 
mandy — Choice of a Profession — Curate in Salisbury Plain — Marries his Brother 
—Becomes Tutor to Mr Beach — Goes to Edinburgh, . . . i 

CHAPTER II. 
Arrives at Edinburgh — State of Society — Manners of Scotch — Anecdote of Mr Jef- 
frey — Acquaintance with Mr Horner — Marriage — Early Difficulties and Poverty 
— Generosity— Birth of Daughter — Introduces Mr Allen to Lord Holland — 
Originates Review — State of Society — State of Church — Character of his 
Writings in Youth — Sketch of Opinions at the Time — Letter by Lord Mont- 
eagle — Short Sketch of Articles in Review, . . . . . ia 

CHAPTER III. 
Kxtracts from Lectures — Preface to Sermons — Analysis of Sermons — Sermon for 
the Blind — Returns to Edinburgh — Takes Pupils — Illness of Daughter — Moral 
Courage — Studies Medicine and Moral Philosophy, . . . .43 

CHAPTER IV. 
Quits Edinburgh for London— Settles in Doughty Street — Makes Legal and other 

Friends — Obtains Preachership of Foundling Hospital — Refusal of Dr to 

enable him to Lease a Chapel — Sermon to Volunteers — Friendship with Lord 
Holland — Introduction to Holland House — Holland House, and Society there — 
Obtains Preachership of St John's Chapel, Bedford Square — Gives Lectures at 
Royal Institution — Descriptions of their Effect — Poverty — Society at his House, 
and Suppers— Anecdote of Sir J. Mackintosh and Cousin— Elected to the John- 
son Literary Ciub — The King reads his Review, and says he will never be a 
Bishop — Preaches on Toleration at the Temple Church — Increase of Reputation 
and Friends — Natural Spirits ; their Effects — Some Anecdotes, . . . 57 

CHAPTER V. 

1806. Political Changes — Obtains Preferment — 1807. Goes to Sonning in the Autumn 
— Writes Peter Plymley— Its Effect — Makes the Acquaintance of Lord Stowell— 
Revisits Edinburgh — Goes to Howick — No House on Living — Non-Residence 
Permitted — Residence Bill Passed — Goes down to see Living — Difficulties — 
Returns to London — Publishes Sermons — Removes Family to Yorkshire — Tries 
to Negotiate Exchange of Living — Difficulties of Exchange — Necessity of 
Building — Settles at Heslington, . . . . , . .81 

CHAPTER VI. 
Establishment in Yorkshire — Habits ; Mode of Life— Reading — Attention to Chil- 
dren — Power of Abstracting Thoughts — Farmers' Dinner— Medical Anecdotes- 
Experiments — Extracts from Diary— Practical Essays— Metaphysical Essays — 
Hints for History— Mr Macaulay's Letter— Sir S. Romilly's Visit— Sermon on 
his Death — Anecdote of Roasted Quaker — Dining out in the Country — Brother 
and Sir J. Mackintosh's Return from India— Madame de Stael's Visit to Eng- 
land—Typhus Fever— Verses on Mr Jeffrey, , . . . .87 

CHAPTER VII. 
Builds House— Removes to Foston— Description of Establishment— Visit of Sir 
James Mackintosh— Becomes a Magistrate— Visit to Newgate with Mrs Fry, 



xii CONTENTS. 

PAGB 

and Sermon — Visit to Sir G. Philips in Immortal— Forms the Acquaintance of 
the Earl of Carlisle — Death of only Sister — Last Visit from Mr Horner — Bad 
Harvest, and Fever — Exertions amongst the Poor — Visit from Lord and Lady 
Holland — Leaves off Riding — Description of Calamity — Shopping and Anec- 
dotes — Sends Son to School — Visits Lord Grey — Account of Travels — Visit from 

Dr Marcet — Conversation, and Bunch — Anecdote of Lord 's Son — Assizes 

— Hunt's Trial — Danger of Bad Harvest — Death of Grattan, . . .113 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Legacy — Visit to Edinburgh— Visits London — Popularity there — Letters to Home, 
and Care of Parish — Takes Son to Charterhouse — Visits Mr Rogers — Appointed 
Chaplain to High Sheriff— Preaches in Cathedral — Anecdote at Spencer House 
— Meeting of Clergy, East Riding— His Petition— Speech— Living of Londes- 
borough — Goes to Paris— Letter on Receiving Irreligious Book — Death of 
Father — Description of House by Friend — Love of Chess and Singing — Mar- 
riage of Youngest Daughter — Becomes Canon of Bristol — Effect produced at 
Bristol— History of Apologue, by Mr Everett, , . . . .134 

CHAPTER IX. 

Happiness increased by his Promotion — Death of Eldest Son — Removal to Combe 
Florey — Rebuilding of House — Lord Jeffrey's Last Visit — Increased Popularity 
at Bristol — Collects Contributions to Review — French Revolution — Riots at 
Bristol — Speech on Reform — Letters on Preferment — Appointed Canon of St 
Paul's — Death of Sir James Mackintosh in 1832 — Marriage of Eldest Daughter 
in 1834 — Village Anecdotes — Christens Grandchild — Buys House in Charles 
Street— Rectitude of Stewardship at St Paul's— Tour to Holland in 1837 — Tal- 
leyrand — Conversation in London, and Anecdotes — Begins Controversy about 
Church — Petitions to House of Lords — Inscription for Statue of Lord Grey, . 152 

CHAPTER X. 
Visit to Combe Florey — Kindness to Grandchildren — Sudden Wealth — Recollections 
of his Parishioners at Foston — Death of Lord Holland : His Portrait — Letter 
to Mr Webster — Sketch of " Revue des Deux Mondes " — Letter of Mr Grenville 
— Visit from Mr Moore, and Verses — Bestows the Living of Edmonton on Mr 
Tate's Son — Letter to Mrs Sydney Smith— Address of Parishioners, and Answer 
— Letter of Mrs Marcet — Recipe for making Every Day Happy — Definition of 
Happiness — Petition to the American Congress in 1843 — Effects — Speech from 
Mr Ticknor — Letter from Mr Wainwright — Abuse and Gifts from America — 
Effect of Preaching in Old Age — Letter of Miss Edgeworth — Correspondence 
with Sir R. Peel — Extract from Journal, with Anecdotes, , . ,185 

CHAPTER XL 
Pamphlet on Ballot — Fragment on Irish Church — Letter from Lord Murray — Lines 
Written on Receiving Garden-Chair — Lines by Lady Carlisle — Christens Child 
— Sketch of Life and Conversation at Combe Florey — Advice to Parishioners 
— Conversation — Medicines for the Poor — Saves Servant's Life — Fallacies — 
Studies — Recipe for Salad — Letter of Marion t de Lorme — Imitation of , Sir 
James Mackintosh — Close of the Day, . . . . , .211 

CHAPTER XII. 

Extract from Lady 's Journal — Last Illness — Comes to Town — Dr Chambers 

called in — Anxiety of Friends for his Recovery — Meeting of Brothers — Living 
presented to a poor Clergyman — Death of Sydney Smith— Death of his eldest 
Brother — Lord Jeffrey's Letters — Hints on Female Education, . . . 251 

Letters, ........... 285 

List of Articles in the Edinburgh Review, . . . . . .623 

Tndex, ..,.-<..... 624 



MEMOIR 



OF THE 



REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



CHAPTER I. 

Birth and Family. — Father. — Profession. — Marriage of Father.— Mother. — Sir Isaac 
Newton. — School.— Early Peculiarities. — Talleyrand. — College.— Goes to Nor- 
mandy. — Profession. — Curate on Salisbury Plain. — Marries his Brother. — Becomes 
Tutor to Mr Beach. — Goes to Edinburgh. 

My father, the Rev. Sydney Smith, was born at Woodford, in 
Essex, 1 77 1, the second of four brothers and one sister, all 
remarkable for their talents ; the two eldest eminently so. To 
these talents, as well as to his great animal spirits, he had an 
hereditary right ; for my grandfather, Mr Robert Smith, was a 
man of singular natural gifts ; very clever, odd by nature, but still 
more odd by design. Loving to astonish, and fully aware that 
knowledge is power, he employed the activity of a very sagacious 
mind, through a long and varied life, in acquiring a minute 
acquaintance with the history of all he came in contact with. On 
becoming early his own master, by the death of his father, and 
possessed of some money, my grandfather employed all the early 
part of life (having first married a very beautiful girl, from whom 
he parted at the church-door, leaving her with her mother, Mrs 
Olier, till his return from America) partly in wandering over the 
world for many years ; and partly in diminishing his fortune by 
buying, altering, spoiling, and then selling about nineteen different 
places in England ; till, in his old-age, he at last settled at Bishop's 
Lydiard, in Somersetshire, where he died. 

My grandfather was a very handsome and picturesque old man 
when I knew him ; his hair long, thin, and perfectly white, and his 
figure slight and rather bent. To add to the effect of his appearance 

A 



2 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

and manner, he used to affect the drab-coloured dress of a Quaker, 
with a large flat hat, rather like those of our coal-heavers. This 
hat was so extraordinary in form, and had seen so many years' 
service, that when at last he offered its remains to his old factotum 
Charles, who was digging in his garden, the man, after twisting 
and twirling it round and round for some time, and examining its 
proportions, returned it to him with a broad grin, saying, " No, 
thank your honour, it 's no use to I." I remember him sitting in 
his arm-chair basking in the sun, leaning forward on his crutch- 
stick, a fine study for Rembrandt ; and telling this story of his 
favourite hat till the tears ran down his cheeks with laughter. 

But though the sons inherited talent from their father, yet all the 
finer qualities of their mind they derived from their mother, Miss 
Maria Olier, — the youngest daughter of a French emigrant, from Lan- 
guedoc, who was driven over to England for his religious principles, 
at the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and was reduced to great 
poverty in consequence- His eldest daughter, Miss Olier, a woman 
of much intelligence and energy of character, established a school 
for young ladies in Bloomsbury Square, which acquired considerable 
celebrity under her direction, and thus enabled her to contribute 
to the support of her family. My father used to attribute a little of 
his constitutional gaiety to this infusion of French blood. His 
maternal grandfather, Mr Olier, I have heard, could not speak a 
word of English. He married a Miss Maria Barton, who was a 
collateral descendant of Sir Isaac Newton's, through his mother's 
second marriage, — a very distinguished ancestor to possess, and 
one not to be lightly passed over. 

My grandmother, Mrs Robert Smith, Mr Oiler's youngest 
daughter, had (I have been told, for I never saw her) a noble 
countenance, which two of her sons inherited, and as noble a 
mind. To her early care of them, and to the respect with which 
her virtues and high tone of feeling inspired their young hearts, 
may be ascribed much that was good and great in their characters. 
The charm of her mind and manner extended even to her corres- 
pondence. I heard a singular proof of this the other day, from a 
schoolfellow of my father's, who said that when he or his younger 
brother Courtenay received one of her letters at Winchester, the 
schoolboys would often gather round and beg to hear it read aloud. 
Her influence, however, did not remain to them very long in after- 
life. Delicate ; — with a husband who, though delightful from the 
charm of his manner and powers of conversation to the world, was 
not very well suited to domestic life, from his wandering habits ; — 
and with the natural anxiety of a mother about four such sons, 
often left for long periods entirely to her care and guidance, she 
fell into ill-health while still young and beautiful, and, to the deep 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 3 

regret of all who knew her, died about two years after the marriage 
of my father. 

This reminds me of an anecdote of Talleyrand, who, when living 
as an emigrant in this country, was on very intimate terms with 
her eldest son, Robert, more generally known by the name given 
him by his schoolfellows at Eton, of Bobus. The conversation 
turned on the beauty often transmitted from parents to their 
children. My uncle, who was singularly handsome (indeed I think 
I have seldom seen a finer specimen of manly beauty, or a coun- 
tenance more expressive of the high moral qualities he possessed), 
perhaps with a little youthful vanity, spoke of the great beauty of 
his mother ; on which Talleyrand, with a shrug, a smile, and a sly 
disparaging look at my uncle's fine face, as if he saw nothing to 
admire in it, exclaimed, "Ah ! mon ami, c'etait done apparemmenl 
Monsieur votre pere qui n'etait pas bien." 

The peculiarities and talents of the young Smiths were very early 
evinced. Their mother describes them as neglecting games; 
seizing every hour of leisure for study ; and often lying on the floor, 
stretched over their books, discussing with loud voice and most 
vehement gesticulation, every point that arose, — often subjects 
above their years, — and arguing upon them with a warmth and 
fierceness of manner as if life and death hung upon the issue ; — a 
most interesting and curious spectacle, to a mother justly proud of 
her boys, and rejoicing in these signs of their future distinction. 

They were like young athletes, constantly trying their intellectual 
strength against each other ; " and the result," I have heard my 
father say, " was to make us the most intolerable and overbearing 
set of boys that can well be imagined, till later in life we found our 
level in tjie world." 

As his sons were so nearly of an age, Mr Robert Smith deemed 
it advisable to separate them at school as much as possible, that 
there might not be too strong rivalry between them. Robert, the 
eldest, with Cecil, the third son, were therefore sent to Eton ; where 
Robert distinguished himself greatly, and was one of the four boys 
(he was then only eighteen) who wrote in the ''Microcosm ;" Mr 
Canning, Mr Frere, and Mr John Smith, being the other three. 

From Eton he went to King's College, Cambridge, where (says a 
sketch of him written, I believe, by his friend Lord Carlisle, after 
his death) " he added materially to the reputation for scholarship 
and classical composition which he had established at school ; and 
if the most fastidious critics of our day would diligently peruse the 
three triposes which he composed in Lucretian rhythm, on the three 
systems of Plato, Descartes, and Newton, we believe that we should 
not run the least risk of incurring the charge of exaggeration, in 
declaring that these compositions in Latin verse have not been ex- 



4 MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 

celled since Latin was a living language. Be this said with the 
peace of Milton and Cowley, with the peace of his fellow-Etonians, 
Grey and Lord Wellesley." 

My father was sent as early as six years of age to a school at 
Southampton (kept by the Rev. Mr Marsh, a scholar of some 
celebrity), which he always spoke of with pleasure. Whilst there 
he received much kindness and attention from the family of the 
present Lady Mildmay, whose friendship he retained from that 
time, and who still survives her old friend. From thence he was 
sent, with his youngest brother, Courtenay, to the foundation at 
Winchester ; — a rough and dangerous apprenticeship to the world 
for one so young ; from which Courtenay ran away twice, unable to 
bear its hardship. My father suffered here many years of misery 
and positive starvation. There never was enough provided, even 
of the coarsest food, for the whole school, and the little boys were 
of course left to fare as they could. Even in old-age my father used 
to shudder at the recollections of Winchester, and I have heard 
him speak with horror of the wretchedness of the years he spent 
there : the whole system was then, my father used to say, one of 
abuse, neglect, and vice. It has since, I believe, partaken of the 
general improvement of education. However, in spite of hunger 
and neglect, he rose in due time to be Captain of the school, and, 
whilst there, received, together with his brother Courtenay, a most 
flattering but involuntary compliment from his schoolfellows, who 
signed a round-robin,* " refusing to try for the College prizes if the 
Smiths were allowed to contend for them, as they always gained 
them." He used to say, "I believe, whilst a boy at school, I made 
above ten thousand Latin verses, and no man in his senses would 
dream in after-life of ever making another. So much for life and 
time wasted ! " 

At school my father was not only leader in learning, but in mis- 
chief ; and was discovered inventing a catapult by lamplight, and 
commended for his ingenuity by the master, who little dreamt it 
was intended to capture a neighbouring turkey, whose well-filled 
crop had long attracted the attention, and awakened the desires of 
the hungry urchins. In after-life he was fond of telling an incident 
which happened to him when either at Winchester or Oxford, I am 
not sure which. A friend who was making a tour, wrote in great 
distress, asking him to lend him five guineas. He had but four, 
which he was conveying himself to the post, much lamenting he 
had not the sum wanted ; when he suddenly saw shining on the 
high-road before him another guinea, and no owner being to be 
found to claim it, he with joy inclosed it in another cover to his 
friend. 

* To Dr Warton, then Head Master or Warden of Winchester. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. $ 

I have heard my father speak of one of the first things that stimu- 
lated him in acquiring knowledge during his early school-days. A 
man of considerable eminence, whose name I cannot recall, found 
my father reading Virgil under a tree, when all his schoolfellows 
were at play. He took the book out of his hand, looked at it, patted 
the boy's head, gave him a shilling, and said, " Clever boy ! clever 
boy ! that is the way to conquer the world." This produced a strong 
impression on the young Sydney. Whilst at Winchester he had 
been one year Praepositor of the College, and another, Praepositor 
of the Hall. My father left Winchester, as Captain, for New Col- 
lege, Oxford ; where, as such, he was entitled to a Scholarship, and 
afterwards to a Fellowship. New College was chiefly then re- 
nowned for the quantity of port-wine consumed by the Fellows ; 
but the very slender income allowed him by his father, perhaps 
luckily for my father's health, did not permit him to indulge in such 
habits. As my father was too proud to accept what he could not 
return, he lived much out of society, and thus lost one of the 
advantages of College to a poor man — that of making private 
friends. 

Soon after quitting Winchester, and before he became a fellow 
of New College, his father sent him to Mont Villiers, in Normandy, 
where he remained en pension for six months, to perfect his know- 
ledge of French, which he always after spoke with great fluency. 
The fierceness of the French Revolution was then at its height ; and 
for his safety it was thought necessary that he should enrol himself 
in one of the Jacobin Clubs of the town, in which he was entered as 
" Le Citoyen Smit, Membre Afiilie' au Club des Jacobins de Mont 
Villiers." The only revolutionary peril he encountered, however, 
was in attending his two friends, Captain Drinkwater and his brother, 
to Cherbourg. These gentlemen, who were excellent draughtsmen, 
began sketching the works in spite of my father's remonstrances, 
who said, " We shall all be infallibly hung on the next lantern-post, 
if you are seen sketching the fortifications." And in truth, in a 
few minutes they had a gendarme upon them ; and it required all 
my father's skill, address, and knowledge of the language, with a 
few good-humoured jokes, and boasts of his own citizenship, to ex- 
tricate himself and his friends from his hands. When clear 
off — "And now, my friends, no more sketching, if you please," 
said he» 

I know little of my father's career at college, save that he obtained 
his Fellowship as soon as it was possible ; and from that moment 
was cast upon his own resources by his father, who never afterwards 
gave him a farthing till his death. Yet with this small income, about 
;£ioo per annum, he not only preserved that honesty, so often dis- 
regarded by young men, of keeping out of debt ; but undertook 



6 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

gradually to pay a sum of ^30 for a debt incurred when at Win- 
chester School by his younger brother Courtenay, who had not had 
courage to confess it to his father before his departure for India. 
Courtenay became Supreme Judge of the Adawlut Court ; subse- 
quently made a very large fortune ; acquired great reputation as a 
Judge and an Oriental scholar ; returned to this country in his old 
age, and died suddenly a few years afterwards. 

On leaving college it became necessary that my father should 
select a profession. His own inclinations would have led him to 
the bar, in which profession he felt that his talents promised him 
success and distinction, and where a career was open to him that 
might gratify his ambition. But his father (who had been at con- 
siderable expense in bringing up his eldest brother Robert to that pro- 
fession, and fitting out the other two for India), after giving up a pro- 
ject he once had of sending Sydney as supercargo to China, urged 
so strongly his going into the church, that my father, after consider- 
ing the subject deeply, felt it his duty to yield to my grandfather's 
wishes, and sacrifice his own, by entering the church ; and became 
a curate in a small village called Netherhaven, in the midst of Salis- 
bury Plain, in the year 1794. 

Sydney Smith, a curate in the midst of Salisbury Plain ! To 
those who knew him, and his cast of character, the mere statement 
of the fact will be enough to paint his feelings ; but to those who 
knew him not, it would be difficult to express the famine of the mind 
that came over him when planted in that great waste of Nature. 
He has himself described a curate as "the poor working-man of God 
— a learned man in a hovel, good and patient — a comforter and a 
teacher — the first and purest pauper of the hamlet ; yet showing 
that, in the midst of worldly misery, he has the heart of a gentle- 
man, the spirit of a Christian, and the kindness of a pastor." 

This picture can hardly be heightened, as descriptive of a curate 
in the abstract. But here was a curate formed, by his wit and 
powers of conversation, for the society of his fellow-creatures, 
doomed to the most unbroken solitude ; and, pauper as he was, 
with scarcely a hamlet to interest him, for the village consisted but 
of a few scattered cottages and farms, in the midst of Salisbury 
Plain. 

My father seems to have entered into his curacy, as he did at 
a later period into his parsonage-house at Foston, amidst the dis- 
comforts of brick and mortar, and with new-plastered walls, &c. ; 
for he writes, saying, " The extreme heat of the summer has dried 
the walls, and the smell of paint is nearly gone.' , The curacy too, 
even when repaired, and in its best garb, must have been a most un- 
inviting spot j for just before leaving it he says, " I have not yet got 
a successor. A gentleman curate called to-day to survey the place 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 7 

and premises, but galloped away in two minutes, with every mark 
of astonishment and antipathy." Once a week a butcher's cart 
came over from Salisbury ; it was then only he could obtain any 
meat, and he often dined, he said, on a mess of potatoes, sprinkled 
with a little ketchup. Too poor to command books, his only re- 
source was the Squire, during the few months he resided there ; 
and his only relaxation, not being able to keep a horse, long walks 
over those interminable plains. 

In one of these solitary walks my father narrowly escaped with 
his life, being overtaken in the midst of the Plain, far from any 
habitation, by a violent snow-storm ; and, having lost all means of 
tracing his way, there being no trees or vestige of human habitation 
for miles round to guide him, it was by mere chance that he arrived, 
late at night, and fearfully exhausted, at his own home. 

On one occasion, when going to visit his father, he says, " I 
walked twenty-six miles, and then got into a coach which overtook 
me." He mentions here a comical instance of the love of change 
in my grandfather, Mr Robert Smith,— a taste which has been 
before alluded to. " When I arrived at the mansion of Beauchamp, 
I found a large mud-wall instead of a gate, and every path and 
avenue to the house entirely obliterated. I procured a guide and 
got into the parlour, where I found my father, immeasurably de- 
lighted at having puzzled me by his improvements." 

My father seems to have entered upon his curacy, in 1794, with 
every wish to improve both himself and his parish. He writes, 
declining a visit, saying, " My theological studies will necessarily 
occupy a great deal of my time, and I mean to try if I cannot per- 
suade the poor people to come to church ; for really at present (as 
was said of Burke at Hastings' trial) 'my preaching is like the voice 
of one crying in the wilderness.' " Shortly after, writing to Mrs 
Beach in reference to this subject, he says : — 

" Madam, — In our conversations about the poor at Netherhaven, 
you agreed with me that some of the boys and girls might possibly 
be prevented from attending church, or the Sunday school, from a 
want of proper clothing. On Sunday last there were three or four 
children with their feet on the cold stones, without any shoes ; and 
one came, a perfect sans-culotte, or at least with only such grinning 
remnants of that useful garment as were just sufficient to show that 
he was so clad from necessity, and not from any ingenious theory 
he had taken up against a useful invention. If the Sunday school 
had begun, I should have imagined that the poor boy thought it 
his duty to come ready for whipping, as a fowl is sent from the 
poulterer's trussed and ready for roasting. In whatsoever manner, 
to whatsoever extent, you may choose to alleviate this species of 
misery, be so good as to remember that I am on the spot, and shall 



8 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

be happy to carry your benevolent intentions into execution in the 
best manner I am able." 

And again, in January, 1796, he writes : — 

" Madam, — Immediately on my return from my father's, I pro- 
ceeded to organize your school of industry. I have selected one 
girl from every family in the parish, whose poverty entitled them 
to such relief. They amount to twenty. 1 have set them, first of 
all, upon making a coarse canvas-bag each, to hold their work in ; 
which bags will be numbered, and hung up round the room when 
they leave school. We have divided the week between darn- 
ing, sewing, and knitting ; spinning is postponed for the present. 
I have weighed out materials to Mr Bendam ; his salary is fixed at 
four shillings per week, and firing. I shall attend closely to your 
new seminary while I stay, and shall before my departure write 
down and submit to you such regulations as I think conducive to 
the welfare of that and the Sunday school. You have no idea of 
the emulation the master has inspired them with. All the while 
I was at my father's there was not a single child absent." 

On leaving his curacy in 1797, one of the first professional duties 
he was called upon to perform was to marry his eldest brother 
Robert to Miss Vernon, aunt to the present Lord Lansdowne. In 
December, 1797, ^ e writes word from Bowood : — "They have sent 
for me here, to marry my brother to Miss Vernon, daughter of Lady 
Ossory and Mr Vernon." He adds : — " I would write more, but it 
is dinner-time, and Lord Lansdowne gives such good dinners that 
they are to be by no means neglected ; and especially not by such 
an epicure as me."* 

In a letter to his mother on the occasion of my uncle's marriage 
to Miss Vernon, my father says : — " The marriage took place in the 
library at Bowood, and all I can tell you of it is that he cried, she 
cried, and I cried." The only tears I believe this marriage ever 
produced, save those we shed on her grave. 

During the period of my father's curacy, the Squire, after the 
good old orthodox fashion of squires, often asked his curate to 
dinner on Sunday ; and, to his surprise, had found the tedium of 
a. Sunday evening in the country so much beguiled by the society 
of his young friend, that the invitations became more and more 
frequent. This acquaintance soon ripened into friendship ; and 
ended by Mr Beach requesting my father to resign his curacy at 
the termination of the two years, and accompany his eldest son 
abroad. Here my father best paints what happened. 

"When first I went into the Church, I had a curacy in the middle 

* Rendered the more striking, perhaps, by the contrast they afforded to his own 
homely fare just described. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 9 

of Salisbury Plain ; the parish was Netherhavcn, near Amesbury. 
The Squire of the parish, Mr Beach, took a fancy to me, and after 
I had served it two years, he engaged me as tutor to his eldest son, 
and it was arranged that I and his son should proceed to the Uni- 
versity of Weimar, in Saxony. We set out ; but before reaching 
our destination, Germany was disturbed by war, and, in stress of 
politics, we put into Edinburgh, where I remained five years. The 
principles of the French Revolution were then fully afloat, and it 
is impossible to conceive a more violent and agitated state of 
society." 

The expedition to the University of Weimar being thus frus- 
trated, my father and his young pupil, accompanied by their German 
courier Mithoffer, set off. for Edinburgh. I have lately been most 
kindly furnished with all the letters my father wrote to Mr and Mrs 
Beach during his residence there with their sons ; and though they 
will add nothing to his reputation for talent, and may not have 
much general interest, as they refer chiefly to his intercourse with 
his pupils and his observations on their characters, yet his views 
on the education of young men cannot be without their value. 
And as it is my object in these pages to paint my father in every 
relation of life, I do not think that one in which (instead of the com- 
mon bargain of Greek and Latin for salary on these occasions) he 
seems to have placed himself so completely in loco parentis, not 
only in name, but in spirit and affection, ought to be entirely passed 
over. I shall therefore make such selections from these letters as 
may best effect my object, and likewise show his early impressions 
on first entering the world ; placing them here rather than amongst 
the general correspondence, as they refer solely to this period of his 
life. And I do this with the less scruple, as my readers have the 
remedy in their own hands, should they find me dull. In writing 
an account of their progress to Edinburgh, my father says : — 

" We stayed at Warwick Castle, Sunday, slept there, and set off 
Monday after breakfast ; having experienced from Lord Warwick* 
the most hospitable reception. The merry yeomen of Warwick- 
shire and Birmingham are all drunk. Their colours have been pre- 
sented to-day : as they manufacture their own buttons, spurs, and 
swords, they are prodigiously fine. You consider me of a' very 
impatient disposition : I wish you had seen me this evening sitting 
out a Birmingham play ; no leaden statue could have been so im- 
movable. We had two ' Rule Britannias,' three ' God save the 
Kings/ and four other songs about Britons. Michael seemed very 
much pleased. With Matlock I was enchanted, but Nature, who 
never yet made a clever fellow without making half-a-dozen block- 
heads by way of compensation, or a beautiful place without some 

• Brother-in-law to Mr Robert Smith. 



io MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

correspondent desolation, made us refund in the road from Bake- 
well to Disley all the pleasure we had experienced at Matlock. We 
proceeded through a scandalous country to Buxton. That any but 
felonious, larcenous culprits, sent there by order of a court of justice, 
should be found convened together in Buxton, is to me a matter 
of most profound astonishment. The water I maintained to be 
common water. I doubted very much, in passing over the road, 
whether I should put myself to death or go to sleep ; but during 
the debate I unconsciously adopted the latter, and so the matter 
was settled. 

" We have met with great politeness at Birmingham and Man- 
chester. At Birmingham we dined with a democratic weaver of 
corduroys, who complained of the ruin of their business. His claret 
was however extremely good ; and he politely escorted us over the 
chief part of the manufactories of the place the next morning. 
Liverpool exhibits a wonderful scene of activity and enterprise. 
From thence to the Lakes ; I think Derwent water the prettiest, 
Ulleswater the grandest lake. I was particularly struck with the 
mountains that border parts of Windermere. I prefer Lord W. 
Gordon's place upon Derwentwater to Mr Curwen's on Winder- 
mere ; and quarrel with the alehouse simplicity of the Duke of 
Norfolk's. People mistake this matter of simplicity strangely. Is 
it necessary to sit upon boards painfully hard, and put your feet 
upon malthouse floors, because you retire to a beautiful lake for two 
or three of the hot months of the year ? There is surely some 
medium between mud and marble, and huckaback and brocade ! 

" Off we set, Michael, the guide, and myself, at one in the morning, 
to gain the summit of Skiddaw. I, who find it rather difficult to 
stick upon my horse on the plainest roads, did not find that facility 
increased by the darkness of the morning, or the precipitous path 
we had to ascend. I made no manner of doubt but that I should 
roll over into the town of Keswick the next morning, and be picked 
up by the town beadle, dead in a gutter. Moreover I was moved 
a little for my reputation ; for, as I had a bottle of brandy in my 
pocket, placed there by the special exhortations of the guide and land- 
lord, the Keswick coroner and jury would infallibly have brought 
me in 'a parson as died of drinking.' However, onward we moved, 
and arrived at the summit. The thermometer stood at twenty ; 
the wind was bitter, and the summit totally enveloped in thick 
clouds, which nearly wetted us through, and totally cut off all view 
of the sun and the earth too. Here we regaled on biscuit and 
brandy, and waited for the dissipation of the vapour. The guide 
seemed to be about as much affected by the weather as Skiddaw 
itself ; which mountain, in height and brownness of complexion, he 
something resembled. I was rueful enough, though I really rejoiced 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. n 

in the novelty of the scene j but a more woe-begone, piteous face 
than Michael put on, you never saw. No tailor, tried, cast, and 
condemned for niching small parcels of cloth, ever looked so 
unhappy. The wind, the complaisant wind, now puffed away the 
vapours at intervals, and gave us a hasty view in different quarters, 
of the magnificent scene which surrounded us. Above us was the 
blue heaven, and all under were the sons of men, scattered in fair 
cities, and upon hills and down in the dales, and over the whole 
face of the earth. And so we went down, and Michael grew warm 
and ate a monstrous breakfast, and was quite pleased with his ex- 
cursion, and all was well. 

" The country on our way here was abominable ; the inns bad, 
the postchaises dirty, everything indicative of vermin and want. 
With Edinburgh I am delighted as surprised, though it is offensive 
to the nose as it is delightful to the eye." No smells were ever equal 
to Scotch smells ; it is the school of physic. Yet the place is uncom- 
monly beautiful, and I am in a constant balance between admiration 
and trepidation. 

'Taste guides my eye where'er new beauties spread, 
While prudence whispers, Look before you tread V" 

Speaking of the modes of conveyance, he says : — " Do not form 
your ideas of chaises in Scotland and the north of England from 
what you see in the south. The chance is of not getting them at 
all, or getting them in so wretched a state that it is not only dis- 
creditable and inconvenient, but positively unsafe, to ride in them. 
We were put into chaises with half a bottom, with no glasses to the 
windows or fastenings to the door; and we not unfrequently might 
have been taken for a party of convicted Scotchmen on our road to 
Newgate" 



CHAPTER II. 

Arrives at Edinburgh.— State of Society.— Manners of Scotch. — Anecdote of Mr Jeffrey, 
— Acquaintance with Mr Horner. — Marriage. — Early Difficulties and Poverty.— 
Generosity. — Birth of Daughter. — Introduces Mr Allen to Lord Holland. — Origi- 
nates "Review.'' — State of Society. — State of Church. — Character of his Writings in 
Youth. — Sketch of Opinions at the Time. — Letter by Lord Monteagle. — Short Sketch 
of Articles in " Review." , 

In the year 1797, the period, I believe, at which my father arrived 
in Edinburgh with his pupil, Mr Beach, that city was rich in talent, 
full of men who have acted important parts whilst they lived, and 
many of whom have left names that will live after them : — Jeffrey, 
Horner, Playfair, Walter Scott, Dugald Stewart, Brougham, Allen, 
Brown, Murray, Leyden, Lord Web'b Seymour, Lord Woodhouse- 
lee,* Alison, Sir James Hall, and many others. 

Society at that time in Edinburgh was upon the most easy and 
agreeable footing. The Scotch were neither rich nor ashamed of 
being poor, and there was not that struggle for display which so 
much diminishes the charm of London society, and has, with the 
increase of wealth, now crept into that of Edinburgh. Few days 
passed without the meeting of some of these friends, either in each 
other's houses, or (in what was then very common) oyster-cellars ; 
where, I am told, the most delightful little suppers used to be given, 
in which every subject was discussed, with a freedom impossible in 
larger societies, and with a candour which is only found where men 
fight for truth and not for victory. 

Into this soil, then, so congenial to his mind and tastes, my 
father was transplanted ; and, though a perfect stranger, the kind- 
ness with which he was received is best shown by the strong attach- 
ment he ever retained for his Scotch friends, though far removed 
from them in after life, and by the pleasure with which he always 
looked back to this period, which he often refers to in his letters. 
In one of them he exclaims, " When shall I see Scotland again ? 
Never shall I forget the happy days passed there, amidst odious 
smells, barbarous sounds, bad suppers, excellent hearts, and most 
enlightened and cultivated understandings!" I believe he kept 
up, with hardly any exception, the friendships then formed ; and I 
heard an incident the other day which, trifle as it was, showed such 
affection for my father's memory that it quite touched me. One 

* Father of the historian Mr Patrick F. Tytler. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 13 

evening my father was at his old friend Lord Woodhouselcc's 
country-house, near Edinburgh, when a violent storm of wind arose, 
and shook the windows so as to annoy everybody present and 
prevent conversation. " Why do you not stop them ? " said my 
father ; " give me a knife, a screw, and a bit of wood, and I will 
cure it in a moment ;" he soon effected his purpose, fixed up his 
little bit of wood, and it was christened Sydney's button. Fifty 
years after, one of the family finding Mr Tytler papering and paint- 
ing this room, exclaimed, " Oh ! James, you are surely not touching 
Sydney's button ? " but on running to examine the old place at the 
window, she found Sydney's button was there, preserved and re- 
spected amidst all the changes of masters, time, and taste. 

Soon after the arrival of my father, his pupil, and Mithoffer, the 
German courier, in Edinburgh, my father writes to Mrs Beach : — 

"Edinburgh, July i$t/i, 1798. 
" My dear Madam, 

" We are just removed into our new lodgings, No. 38 Hanover 
Street, where we are very conveniently, pleasantly, and, for Edin- 
burgh, cheaply lodged. Our situation is in the centre of the finest 
street I have yet seen in Great Britain, and commands a view of 
the Firth shipping and opposite shore. We have the whole floor, 
a kitchen, a servant, and all furniture found us, for about £2, is. 
a-week. The boarding tables are very objectionable here ; and 
Mithoffer and myself make out extremely well in housekeeping. 

" I am quite satisfied with Michael. He makes every effort in 
his power to improve himself. Occasionally his dislike of study 
makes him a little slow and careless, but a word sets everything to 
rights." 

Speaking of some of their first acquaintances in Edinburgh, he 
mentions " Lord Webb Seymour, whom we both like very much ; 
Mr Stewart, Professor of Moral Philosophy in this University, and 
I believe generally considered to be one of the first men in it ; and 
Mr Dalzel, Greek Professor, of whom we have as yet seen but 
little." Shortly after he says : — " We have added to our acquaint- 
ance Mr and Lady Charlotte Hope. Mr Hope * is a gentleman of 
eminence at the Scotch Bar, and appears to be a plain, sensible 
man ; Lady Charlotte, a daughter of Lord Hopetoun's, is a charming 
woman." A few months after, my father writes to Mrs Beach : — " I 
have had great domestic troubles since I wrote to you last. The 
housemaid has rebelled. She has seven sweethearts, and says she 
will go out. I have, I think, conquered her." 

* Afterwards Lord President. 



14 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

My father gives an amusing account of his early attempts at 
housekeeping in Edinburgh. " Mithoffer," he says, " continues to 
behave extremely well. As he is not a very good judge of meat, I 
have been forced to go to market myself two or three times, but 
now the courier is very much improved. We all tried to make a 
pie by our joint efforts, — the cook, Mithoffer, and I ; the crust was 
as hard as biscuit, and we could not eat it. There is always some 
beef in the salting tub ; and I look into the family affairs like a fat 
old lady of forty. The cook has 6d. per day, and the other girl her 
board only. I have been in a terrible quandary about lodgings. 
The woman of the house where I live was extremely civil all the 
summer, when lodgings are of no value ; but at the approach of 
winter, when the town was so full that no lodgings were to be got, 
because I would not give her twelve guineas a month instead of 
nine, she called me a Levite, a scourge of human nature, and an 
extortioner, and gave me notice to go out instantly, bag and bag- 
gage, without beat of drum or colours flying. I refused to stir ; 
and after a very severe battle, in which I threatened to carry it 
through all the courts of law in England, and from thence to 
Russia, she began to make the amiable, and to confess that she 
was apt to be a little warm ; that she had the most perfect confi- 
dence in my generosity, and the old story. I made her sign an 
agreement, with subscription of two witnesses ; and I am now lord 
of the castle for the time I tell you." 

Speaking of his occupations with his pupil, he says : — " Michael 
finishes his Latin studies at the end of the month, and I mean to 
exercise him for some time in English composition, a pursuit in 
which we shall have perhaps more success, from his conviction of its 
importance. The evenings we have hitherto employed in English 
history, and shall continue to do so for some time. Michael takes 
a lesson in dancing every day. I get him now and then to show 
me a step or two. I cannot bear the repetition of this spectacle 
every day, as it never fails to throw me into a fit of laughing little 
short of suffocation." 

As early as January, 1798, alluding to the excesses of the French, 
and the measures taken by them to injure our commerce, he ex- 
presses, in language then new, but since, from its truth, become 
almost trite, his opinion of the futility of such attempts. 

" Mercantile men are naturally timid, and will, I dare say, be a 
good deal alarmed at these last measures taken against our com- 
merce ; at the same time, I am persuaded there is no cause of real 
alarm in them. We are the only manufacturers in Europe ; if men 
have money, they will purchase the commodities of life. Custom- 
houses as strong as arsenals, squadrons of excisemen, battalions of 
supervisors, can never prevent ingenuity from supplying necessity. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 15 

They may stop up every regular and legitimate approach : desolate 
bays and retired nooks will pour into France and Europe our pins 
and pots and pans, and everything that this shop-keeping nation 
makes and sells ; and all their efforts will only throw that business 
into the hands of outlaws and smugglers, which the merchant would 
have carried on with profit to the national revenue." 

In October of the same year he writes thus : — "Everybody looks 
happy here on account of Jervis's victory. I can compare the joy 
now visible in the public countenance to nothing so much as the 
face of an audience just as the discourse is over, and they are com- 
ing out of church ; a spectacle truly delightful to those who are 
fond of seeing a great number of people happy at once. We were 
alarmed yesterday with the report of a French fleet coming up the 
Firth. I dreamt about it in the night ; thought I took a solemn oath 
to conquer or die ; that I ran away ; that I made a speech, about 
the necessity of fighting, to the soldiers ; that I was found in a ditch 
after the battle, and pelted by Michael and some French drummers, 
&c. &c." 

The German courier having apparently made a petition to Mr 
Beach, that he might be allowed tea, then rather an expensive 
article in household economy, my father writes to him : — " The 
courier shall quaff fragrant bohea at 6s. per pound. May I beg to 
present you with the following most beautiful impromptu on the 
subject, by me ? — 

* His ancient privilege restored by thee, 
The joyous courier quaffs the gratis tea, 
Uplifts the mantling cup, and curses me, 
The unfeeling spoiler of his sweet bohea."' 

Speaking of the talents and studies of his pupil, my father says : 
— * I continue to think much higher of Michael's abilities than I 
did at first acquaintance. Talents are not to be measured by our 
progress in studies which we engage in contrary to, but by those 
which we undertake with, our inclination. For the three months 
we gave up to Latin, our advance was certainly not very rapid ; but 
I am taking some lessons on the pianoforte, merely to pick out a 
few Scotch songs ; and the superior ability with which Michael has 
taught himself the notes and made out the tunes is very remark- 
able. I am forced to consider myself an extremely stupid fellow in 
comparison. 

In considering the character and moral disposition of his pupil, 
the following observations appear to me of value : — 

" Michael is perfectly free from any vice ; but the purity of moral 
habits is, I am afraid, of very little use to a man unless it is accom- 
panied with that degree of firmness which enables him to act up 
to what he may think right, in spite of solicitation to the contrary. 
Very few young men have the power of negation in any great degree 



16 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

at first. It increases with the increase of confidence, and with the 
experience of those inconveniences which result from the absence 
of this virtue. Every young man must be exposed to tempta- 
tion : he cannot learn the ways of men without being witness to 
their vices. If you attempt to preserve him from danger by keeping 
him out of the way of it, you render him quite unfit for any style of 
life in which he may be placed. The great point is, not to turn him 
out too soon, and to give him a pilot at first." 

It is curious to read in the present days the following views of 
our future relations with the French nation. In 1798 my father 
says : — " I now consider the war between France and England no 
longer as an occasional quarrel or temporary dispute, but as an 
antipathy and national horror, after the same kind as subsists be- 
tween the kite and the crow, or the churchwarden and the pauper, 
the weasel and the rat, the parson and the Deist, the bailiff and 
the half-pay captain, &c. &c, who have persecuted each other from 
the beginning of time, and will peck, swear, fly, preach at, and lie in 
wait for each other till the end of time." 

And again, in the same year, he writes : — 

"November, 1798. 
" Dear Sir, — I congratulate you most seriously upon our change 
of situation for the better. Ireland safe ; and Buonaparte embayed 
in Egypt ; that is, surrounded by Beys. That we should sit under 
our vines and fig-trees in safety I do not expect, for the very excel- 
lent reason that we have none to sit under ; but that we shall sit 
round our beef and pudding in security again, I think there is a very 
fair reason to expect. This place grows upon us both ; we are ex- 
tremely comfortably situated, and have thoughts of never coming 
back. To give you some idea of the Highlands, Baron Norton, at 
his seat there, is sixty miles from a market, and twenty miles from a 
post town." 

In one of his letters, alluding to the indifference to religion at that 
time existing in England, and the great contrast in this respect 
which Scotland afforded, he says : — " The best way of giving you 
an idea of the Scotch, is to show you in what they principally differ 
from the English. In the first place (to begin with their physical 
peculiarities) they are larger in body than the English ; and the 
women, in my opinion (I say it to my shame), handsomer than 
English women : their dialect is very agreeable. The Scotch cer- 
tainly do not understand cleanliness ; they are poorer than the 
English ; they are a cautious and a discreet people ; they are very 
much in earnest in their religion, though less so than they were. 
In England I maintain (except amongst ladies in the middle class 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 17 

of life) there is no religion at all. The clergy of England have no 
more influence over the people at large than the cheesemongi rs of 
England. In Scotland the clergy are extremely active in the dis- 
charge of their functions, and are, from the hold they have on the 
minds of the people, a very important body of men. The common 
people are extremely conversant with the Scriptures ; are really not 
so much pupils as formidable critics to their preachers ; many of 
them are well read in controversial divinity. They are perhaps in 
some points of view the most remarkable nation in the world ; and 
no country can afford an example of so much order, morality, 
economy, and knowledge amongst the lower classes of society. 
Every nation has its peculiarity. The very improved state of the 
common people appears to me at present to be the phenomenon of 
this country ; and I intend to give it a good deal of my attention." 

Writing to Mrs Beach on the subject of diet for the poor, a 
subject which always interested him, he says : — " There is in 
Edinburgh a workhouse where those poor who want support are 
sent, and which is supported by a voluntary assessment of all 
the inhabitants. At the church doors there is a collection made 
every Sunday, which is distributed at the discretion of the minister 
and elders ; and this is all the public support that the poor receive. 
The antipathy to the workhouse is very great, and the collections 
not considerable ; and there must be, as I fear there certainly is, a 
great deal of misery here. In one respect the police of Scotland is 
very bad. I suppose there are at least three beggars in this country 
for every one in England, and there is not here the same just reason 
for putting an end to it. They beg in a very quiet, gentle way, and 
thus lose the most productive art of their profession, importunity. 
Have you ever made any effort to introduce a better system of cook-, 
ing amongst the poor ? it would be a great charity. The basis of the 
food of the English poor is fine wheaten bread ; and it is utterly 
impossible that a man, his wife, and four children can have three 
meals a day of dry bread upon fivepence or sixpence, which they 
can of broth on even less. If their manner of appropriating 
their money was better than it is and more provident, their pay 
would certainly be sufficient. I am in hopes to carry this idea into 
execution at some future time, and become master cook as well as 
master parson of my village. The people here understand this 
much better than in England." 

Though truly loving them, his quick sense of the ludicrous made 
him derive great amusement from the little foibles and peculiarities 
of the Scotch : and often has he made them laugh by his descrip- 
tions of things which struck his English eye. " It requires," he 
used to say, "a surgical operation to get a joke well into a Scotch 
understanding. Their only idea of wit, or rather that inferioi 



tV 



, B 



iS MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

variety of this electric talent which prevails occasionally in the 
North, and which, under the name of wut, is so infinitely distress- 
ing to people of good taste, is laughing immoderately at stated 
intervals. They are so imbued with metaphysics that they even 
make love metaphysically. I overheard a young lady of my ac- 
quaintance, at a dance in Edinburgh, exclaim, in a sudden pause 
of the music, ' What you say, my Lord, is very true of love in the 
aibstract, but ' — here the fiddlers began fiddling furiously, and the 
rest was lost. No nation has so large a stock of benevolence of 
heart : if you meet with an accident, half Edinburgh immediately 
flocks to your door to inquire after your ftwe hand or your pure 
foot, and with a degree of interest that convinces you their whole 
hearts are in the inquiry. You find they usually arrange their 
dishes at dinner by the points of the compass ; ' Sandy put the 
gigot of mutton to the south, and move the singet sheep's head a 
wee bit to the nor-wast.' If you knock at the door, you hear a 
shrill female voice from the fifth flat shriek out, ' Wha 's chapping 
at the door V which is presently opened by a lassie with short 
petticoats, bare legs, and thick ankles. My Scotch servants bar- 
gained they were not to have salmon more than three times a week, 
and always pulled off their stockings, in spite of my repeated ob- 
jurgations, the moment my back was turned." " Their temper 
stands anything but an attack on their climate. They would have 
you even believe they can ripen fruit ; and, to be candid, I must 
own in remarkably warm summers I have tasted peaches that 
made most excellent pickles ; and it is upon record that at the siege 
of Perth, on one occasion, the ammunition failing, their nectarines 
made admirable cannon balls. Even the enlightened mind of 
Jeffrey cannot shake off the illusion that myrtles flourish at Craig 
Crook. In vain I have represented to him that they are of the 
genus Cardans, and pointed out their peculiarities. In vain I 
have reminded him that I have seen hackney-coaches drawn by 
four horses in the winter, on account of the snow ; that I had 
rescued a man blown flat against my door by the violence of the 
winds, and black in the face ; that even the experienced Scotch 
fowls did not venture to cross the streets, but sidled along, tails 
aloft, without venturing to encounter the gale. Jeffrey sticks to 
his myrtle illusions, and treats my attacks with as much contempt 
as if I had been a wild visionary, who had never breathed his 
caller air, nor lived and suffered under the rigour of his climate, 
nor spent five years in discussing metaphysics and medicine in 
that garret of the earth — that knuckle-end of England — that land 
of Calvin, oat-cakes, and sulphur." 

On returning from a little tour they had made in the Highlands 
in the course of the autumn, he writes : — " Michael is in good 



MEMOIR 0J9 THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 19 

health ; we are going on well. If I can, in spite of his reluctance 
to study, carry him on in a course of improvement, tell him his 
faults, and retain his esteem, I shall succeed almost beyond my 
hopes, and entirely to my satisfaction. We have dined at the 

Duke of 's, and met the French King's brother there, and his 

suite. We were not much pleased with our day. Her Grace is a 
most excellent woman, but as stately a piece of ancient life as I 
ever saw. The duke seems to be one of that class of men who 
baffle all attempts to hate, like, praise, or blame them. He knows 
not the earth who has only seen it swelling into the moderate 
elevation, or sinking to the gentle descent of southern hills and 
valleys. He has never trod on the margin of the fearful precipice, 
journeyed over the silent wilderness, and gazed at the torrent 
hiding itself in the profound glen. He has never viewed Nature 
but as she is associated with human industry ; and is unacquainted 
with large tracts of the earth from which the care of man can hope 
for no return ; which seem never to have been quickened with the 
principle of vegetation, or to have participated in the bounties of 
Him whose Providence is over all. This we have seen in the 
Highlands ; but we have mortified the body in gratifying the mind. 
We have been forced to associate oat-cakes and whisky with rocks 
and waterfalls, and humble in a dirty room the conceptions we 
indulged in a romantic glen." 

My father speaks in great admiration of Dunkeld : — " Rocks, 
woods, and waterfalls are tumbled together in delicious horror. 
The order and regularity which have arranged the rest of the 
world never found their way here ; chaos and confusion have 
maintained their ancient empire at Dunkeld." 

And again in another part of their tour : — 

" Nothing struck me more than the Cartland Crags, near Lanark. 
A small river has worked its passage, of ten or twelve feet in 
breadth, through rocks that tower 300 feet above it on each side ; 
the passage is half a mile long. Consider what a scene this must 
be. Near Lanark is settled Mr David Dale ; he alone employs in 
cotton-works 1700 souls. He is a very religious and benevolent 
man, and is remarkably attentive to the morals, as well as the com- 
fort and happiness, of the manufacturing children. They are ad- 
mirably instructed and brought up, with an attention to cleanliness 
that is truly delightful. He very often gives them a dance. The 
evening we were there, after the hours of work there was a general 
country dance of above two hundred couples. We knew nothing 
of it till the following morning, or of course should not have missed 
so pleasing a spectacle. I love to see the beauties of Nature ; but 
I love better to see the hand of active piety stretch forth to such 
young orphans as these the innocent pleasures of life, the benefit of 



2 o MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 

instruction, and the blessings of religion. It is dreadful to observe, 
in Manchester and Birmingham, how manufacturers brutalise man- 
kind,— how small the interval is between a weaver and a beast.* 
What does his country not owe to a man who has promoted industry 
without propagating vice, who has enlarged the boundaries of com- 
merce, and strengthened the ties of moral obligation ? " 

The reigning bore at this time in Edinburgh was : his 

favourite subject, the North Pole. It mattered not how far south 
you began, you found yourself transported to the north pole before 
you could take breath ; no one escaped him. My father declared 
he should invent a slip-button. Jeffrey fled from him as from the 
plague, when possible ; but one day his arch-tormentor met him in 
a narrow lane, and began instantly on the north pole. Jeffrey, in 
despair and out of all patience, darted past him, exclaiming, " D— • 
the north pole I" My father met him shortly after, boiling with 
indignation at Jeffrey's contempt of the north pole. " Oh, my dear 
fellow," said my father, " never mind ; no one minds what Jeffrey 
says, you know ; he is a privileged person ; he respects nothing, 
absolutely nothing. Why, you will scarcely believe it, but it is 
not more than a week ago that I heard him speak disrespectfully of 
the Equator ! " f 

My father, after a more intimate knowledge of the character of 
his pupil, and observing the result of his efforts, writes to his 
parents : — " I had flattered myself that it would have been in my 
power to give him imperceptibly a taste for books and mental im- 
provement. I am now convinced that whatever share of knowledge 
Michael may gain by reading with me, it is quite out of my power 
to give him a taste for books in that degree which I think useful 
and ornamental in his situation of life. Do not be disheartened by 
this opinion. Michael will be (as I have often told you) a very 
worthy, prudent man, with a sufficient share of sound under- 
standing leading to conduct ; an excellent heart, and manners, soft 
and gentlemanlike ; and though literature is an excellent addition 
to all these, it is hardly worth the cost of them. As a clergyman 
and a bachelor, I cannot be supposed to know anything about 
falling in love ; but, judging from what I have heard other people, 
and particularly ladies, talk about it, I really do not think there is 
any danger of the renewal of his passion. He has assured me that 
he is perfectly indifferent to her now ; and, as he is remarkably 
sincere, I really believe him. He is so thoroughly aware, too, of the 
common error of young men in falling in love with the first woman 

* This is so inapplicable to the present day, that it is pleasant to write it down, as a 
proof of the progress made in the last fifty years in the education and intelligence of this 
class of society. 

t I see this anecdote in Mr Moore's Memoirs attributed to Leslie ; but I have so often 
Jieard it told as applying to a very different person, that I think he was mistaken. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 21 

they meet, before they have had the smallest opportunity of judg- 
ing of the sex and comparing different characters and dispositions, 
that I believe, if he were to feel the attacks of that inexpressible 
malady again, he would exert himself effectually to expel them." 

The following is an amusing account of the state of the stage at 
Edinburgh, written in March 1799 : — " Kemble, the player, is come 
down here ; and these wicked people are employing Passion Week 
in going to tragedies and comedies. It is, I am told, extremely 
ludicrous to see him on the stage ; half his time is employed in 
prompting the other actors, and correcting their motions. The 
other evening he was stabbed, and he w r as forced to put his assassin 
in mind that it was time to stab him ; which, you will allow, is rather 
an awkward circumstance. You will be very much surprised that 
the Scotch should so totally neglect all religious worship in this 
week ; but they do not even shut the shops on Good Friday, nor is 
there anything like the sound of prayer in their churches." 

Speaking of the dirt of Edinburgh after a thaw, in 1799 : — " Ex- 
cept the morning after the Flood was over, I should doubt if it had 
ever been dirtier." 

In June of the same year he writes : — " There seems to be every 
appearance of an approaching battle or victory (for they are now 
synonymous) in the Mediterranean ; candles have risen a penny a 
pound, from the possibility of an illumination." 

In September 1799, he made a short tour in Wales with his pupil, 
and says : — " We have been miserably delayed by the state of 
Welsh post-horses, finding it difficult to get on thirty-five miles a 
day. From Machynlleth to Dolgelly, eighteen miles of excellent 
road, we were more than five hours and a half, though we gave the 
horses corn on the road, got out of the carriage, and pushed with 
all our might." 

On their way through W T ales they made a visit to Sir Robert 
Vaughan, which he amusingly describes in one of his letters : — 
" You will be very much pleased with his place, his efforts to im- 
prove the country round him, and his great good-nature and hospi- 
tality. I have seldom seen any man who seems to possess more 
natural mildness and benevolence. He sees from his windows 
Cader Idris and Snowdon, both of them inferior to himself in height 
and breadth. It was curious and amusing to see the worthy 
baronet surrounded by sixteen little men and women, who reached 
up to the waistband of his breeches, and looked like iron rails round 
a monument." 

In the course of this autumn my father had (for the first, and I 
believe only time, with any of his pupils) cause of complaint against 
his young friend Michael ; who on one occasion received his re- 
monstrances with so much disrespect, that my father thought it his 



22 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

duty, both to his pupil and himself, to make it known immediately 
to Mr Beach ; and the result does so much honour to all parties, 
that I shall give it : — 

" October ; 1799. 
" My dear Sir, 
" I was too well convinced of the proper sentiments in which 
you have educated your children to doubt for a moment of the 
manner in which you would express yourself to Michael upon the 
conduct of which I had complained. Your letter produced every 
effect you could have wished from it. He not only apologised to 
me in the most ample manner, but (which convinced me he really 
thought himself wrong) brought in Mithofter, before whom the 
affront was given, to witness the aDology. Of course I said every- 
thing handsome to him on the subject, and I daresay we shall be 
only the better friends for what has passed. It would have been a 
most injurious and mistaken complaisance on my part to have 
sacrificed the real good of your son in order to spare the present 
feelings of his parents." 

In a letter of 1799, alluding to passing events, he says : — " What 
an unaccountable thing, that Mr Pitt should have introduced the 
Union into the Irish Houses without being more sure of his strength ! 
By the by, all the House are going to pair off after the recess : each 
Oppositionist takes his Ministerial man, and this will just make 
101 duels. The Speaker fights the first clerk, for want of a regular 
opponent, and to avoid being idle." 

*' Edinburgh, October, 1789. 
"My dear Madam, 

" Thinking it necessary that Michael should become accustomed 
to the management of larger sums of money than hitherto, I gave 
him ^45. At the University his income must necessarily pass 
through his own hands, and without much possibility of control ; 
and as I shall have an opportunity here of observing his disposition 
with regard to money, I dare say you will approve of what I have 
done. Michael has conducted himself perfectly like a gentleman 
since I had the pleasure of announcing to you our reconciliation. 

" He is occupied from five to six hours a day, which I think is 
quite as long as any young man of his age ought to be kept to his 
studies ; or can be kept with the best effect, and without trespass- 
ing on his health and cheerfulness. We have prayers every night 
at eleven, before which time he understands he is expected not to 
go to bed ; and he gets up early from choice. He is well, and I 
hope not more discontented with his situation than all young men, 
panting for pleasure and idleness, are with a state of education." 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 23 

" 19 Queen Street, Edinburgh, 1800. 
" My dear Sir, 

" The town is overrun with Russians, in green coats, with ugly 
faces and lice, which latter they never crack but when they are 
angry ; and it is a remarkable thing that when a Russian is enraged 
he always combs himself, and takes his revenge upon a thousand 
resistless reptiles. They were very sick aboard ship, but are not 
allowed to land to form an encampment ; only to come on shore in 
the daytime. 

" Mithoffer has been very ill with a sore throat and inflammatory 
fever ; he kept his bed for some days, but is recovered. I had 
made his epitaph and ordered his coffin. 

" We are getting much more acquainted in this place, and sup 
but very frequently, to the infinite delight of Michael. I am almost 
ashamed to say we were invited out every day last week to supper ; 
but as the business of the day is first over, this causes no interrup- 
tion to our studies. In the meantime Michael gains manners, and 
I a headache. Farewell, my dear sir ; believe me that I wish to 
see you and yours well and happy for many, many years to come. 

" Sydney Smith." 

Writing to Mrs Beach in 1799, he says : — "You speak of the loss 
of a hothouse full of grapes as a trifling incident ; there are many 
people who would think the loss of an only son a less grievous 
calamity. ... I am indebted to Michael for an extremely just and 
sensible critique upon my preaching, which pleased me very much, 
and reproved me as much." 

My father tells of his first acquaintance with Horner, who was at 
that time among the most conspicuous young men in " that ener- 
getic and unfragrant city." " My desire to know him proceeded 
first of all from being cautioned against him by some excellent and 
feeble people to whom I brought letters of introduction, and who 
represented him as a person of violent political opinions. I inter- 
preted this to mean a person who thought for himself, who had 
firmness enough to take his own line in life, and who loved truth 
better than he loved Dundas, at that time the tyrant of Scotland. 
I found my interpretation just ; and from then till the period of his 
death we lived in constant society and friendship with each ether." 
In speaking of him after his death, in a letter to his brother, he 
says : — " Horner loved truth so much that he never could bear any 
jesting upon important subjects. I remember one evening the late 
Lord Dudley and myself pretended to justify the conduct of the 
Government in stealing the Danish fleet. We carried on the argu- 
ment with some wickedness against our graver friend ; he could 
not stand it, but bolted indignantly out of the room. We flung up 



24 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

the sash, and, with a loud peal of laughter, professed ourselves 
decided Scandinavians. We offered him not only the ships, but 
all the shot, powder, cordage, and even the biscuit, if he would 
come back ; but nothing could turn him ; he went home, and it 
took us a fortnight of serious behaviour before we were forgiven." 

I wish his pen had left us any account of the other distinguished 
men whose friendship he obtained in Edinburgh ; but it has left 
only one other, and that, I believe, was written at a later period of 
his life. 

My father had by this time so gained the confidence of his old 
friends, Mr and Mrs Beach, by his care of their son, that Mrs 
Beach requested him to select a governess for her daughters ; and 
after some search he obtained the services of a highly cultivated 
lady in reduced circumstances, who had been companion to the 
late Lady Cooper, and had a very high reputation for her sense 
and character. In alluding to the regard due to the feelings of a 
person in her situation, my father pays so pretty a compliment to 
the delicacy of mind he had ever seen evinced by his friends the 
Beaches, that I shall give the passage : — " Upon the fair share of 
respect and attention with which a person who has still all the 
feelings, and had once the situation, of a woman of independent 
fortune will expect to be treated, I shall say nothing, for I never 
saw a family in which they were more delicately attended to than 
in yours ; and with my representations on this subject I am sure 
Miss W is satisfied. On her part you will find nothing irri- 
table ; nothing of a disposition too sensitive for her situation ; but 
that fair, honest pride which every individual should cherish, as the 
best protection of everything good and honourable in our nature." 

In the following letter he speaks of his approaching marriage, - 
and of the poverty in which he had passed his youth : — 

Edinburgh, March 21 , 1800. 
" My dear Madam, 

" I looked into Michael's accounts, which I make him pay him- 
self. A number of little nothings go to make up the sum. Whether 
to call such an account expensive or not, I do not know, because 
I am no judge of what the lawful extravagance of a man of his 
condition is. I have therefore said not a syllable upon the sub- 
ject, and will leave that department to you and Mr B. I got in 
debt by buying books. I never borrowed a farthing of anybody, 
and never received much ; and have lived in poverty and economy 
all my life. My habits therefore may tinge my opinions, and I 
mistrust myself. 

" I should wish, if it suits the convenience of Mr B., to be in 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 25 

England by the end of May, as a longer delay than that might 
possibly retard my marriage for a year. I have some awkward 
business to settle, which will absolutely demand my presence about 
that time. Such a cause as this will, I am sure, appear to you and 
Mr B. quite a sufficient reason for not protracting my stay beyond 
that period. 

" Alas, madam, there will not be a flower in Scotland for eight 
weeks to come ! I gathered a few flowers in my way here, but the 
greater part of those I saw were what I had seen perpetually about 
Williamstrip. I was pleased beyond measure at Mr T 's ser- 
vant turning out so badly. I hope the gentleman at the keyhole 
will be more attended to another time. The method of soldering 
glass is a secret. Michael's unpunctuality is indeed very deep- 
seated, and, I am afraid, beyond my power to eradicate ; but I 
know no human being some part of whose character must not be 
for ever connived at. If you are acquainted with any exception to 
this rule, you are more fortunate in your acquaintance than I ever 
have been or ever expect to be. Even you, good madam, require 
forgiveness on some points ; and I myself, though I approach 
nearer perhaps to absolute perfection than anybody I know, am 
believed by the most accurate judges to fall a little short of it. 

" I have been giving Michael lessons in dancing, and I am sure 
he is very much improved by them, though I am afraid he will 
forget them. 

" This is a great day in Edinburgh, for it is that on which the 
Queen's birthday is celebrated ; and everybody dances to show 
their loyalty, except me ; and I show it by preaching, and have the 
pleasure of seeing my audience nod approbation as they sleep. 

" I remain, with the greatest respect, yours, 

" Sydney Smith." 

"Edinburgh, 1800. 
" My dear Madam, 
" I have been so strongly pressed to preach a sermon for the 
Swiss Cantons, on the 10th of May,— a day on which the town wili 
be extremely full, arid by people to whom Michael and myself are 
under such great obligations in this place, — that I can hardly re- 
fuse ; and in this case we cannot get to town before the end of 
May. I thank you, very sincerely, my dear madam, for your good 
wishes. I never received any for the verification of which I so 
sincerely prayed. But before I can flatter myself that I shall be 
as happy as you and Mr Beach have been, I must take care to 
deserve to be as happy.* Yours, " Sydney Smith." 

* Alluding to his approaching marriage. 



26 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

During a visit to Cheam (Mrs Pybus's country-house), previous 
to his marriage, he writes thus to Mr Beach, giving a general 
account of his stewardship : — 

" Cheam, Surrey, 1 800. 
"My dear Sir, 

" As I have not much to do to-day, and as I always find it more 
easy to write than to talk on important subjects, I shall state to 
you in this manner my opinion of your son ; a duty which I owe 
to you, to him, and myself, and which I have not discharged since 
my return. He is, in the most essential points of character, an 
extremely good young man, true, honest, honourable, and friendly, 
without the smallest tendency to any one vice whatsoever. In 
little points of disposition he never affronts, but has not that desire 
to oblige and to please which is so conspicuous in his brother. 
He has lost enough of his sulkiness to make me hope he will lose 
the rest ; but, upon the whole, he is a good-tempered lad, and has 
gained upon my affection in our twelve months' intercourse. I 
like him, and would serve him where I could, with great pleasure. 
Of his abilities I think much more highly than I did ; but his 
memory is bad. I cannot inspire him with a taste for knowledge 
and for books. He goes through the tasks I assign him with ready 
submission, and without interest ; and what he learns under me he 
will learn by regular and moderate study, steadily and carefully 
followed up. You know how boys are neglected at great schools ; 
and we have, in consequence, been employed in the plain and 
fundamental parts of literature. I should except the mathematics, 
for which he has certainly a considerable taste, and in which his 
progress for the time has given me great pleasure. Time, my dear 
sir, is what we want. You love your children and their society ; 
but I hope, when his health is perfectly re-established, you will 
turn us adrift to our studies. You will excuse me for offering my 
advice ; it by no means precludes you from acting as you please in 
every instance. Upon the whole, I think you have reason to be 
perfectly well satisfied with Michael. I have no doubt he will turn 
into an affectionate child, an agreeable gentleman, and a good 
man. 

" I have all the documents and receipts of our expenses in my 
possession, ready for your inspection. If you wish for more infor- 
mation, and if you think I have overdrawn your account, you have 
the means of indemnification in your own hands, of which I most 
fully authorise you to make use. I do not write upon this subject 
from the smallest doubt of your liberality, but from the fullest con- 
viction of it ; and because I think that the less protected a man is 
by the liberality of his disposition, the more he ought to be by the 
caution of those in whom he confides. I have no suspicion that 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 27 

you believe I have put you to too great an expense ; and, if I hear 
nothing further upon the subject, shall consider myself as fully en- 
titled to conclude you do not. ... I believe when you thought any- 
thing wrong you would tell it to me, rather than hint it to me. I 
remain, with many thanks for your kindness to me, yours, 

" Sydney Smith." 

Mr Beach's eldest son, Michael, having now gone to the Univer- 
sity, it was arranged that his second son, William, should be placed 
under my father's care, in his place. In making arrangements for 
this, he writes to Mr Beach : — 

" I am going, my dear Sir, with your younger son to Edinburgh. 
I must look to England for advancing myself in my profession. I 
am very willing to postpone the execution of these plans ; my time 
and attentions are perfectly at your service. I wish to derive no 
sort of emolument from them ; but I confess I should feel very 
reluctant to break in on the principal of my own small fortune, to 
defray the expenses of that style of society I shall enter into on 
your account. If, therefore, I find that the allowance we talked of, 
with the addition of my own income, will not cover my expenses, I 
am sure you will look upon the overplus as your expense, not mine. 
I think it is very likely there will be no such overplus. I have no 
sort of turn to expense, nor has Mrs Smith ; for I look upon her 
to be full as great an economist as myself. The expenses I chiefly 
fear are house-rent, and the disadvantages always incurred by a 
visitant in distinction to a settler. I have not the least wish for 
public places, and a very small society will content me ; and that 
these are my inclinations and propensities I believe you know as 
well as I do. After all, if you should think these observations un- 
reasonable, I promise to be perfectly satisfied with your decision 
on the subject. Yours, " Sydney Smith." 

My father thus writes to announce his marriage : — 

"June 26, 1800. 
" My dear Sir, 

" Will you have the goodness to forward this letter to my father, 
which is to announce to him the day of my marriage, Wednesday 
next, God willing ; on which day drink my health, and wish as 
well to me and my wife, as I do to you and yours ; and write to me 
at Robert Smith's, Esq., Beauchamp, Tiverton, Devonshire. And 
believe me sincerely yours, " Sydney Smith." 

Thus we find that after two years' residence in Edinburgh he had 
returned to England, to marry Miss Pybus, to whom he had long 



2S MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

been engaged, and whom he had known from a very early period 
of his life, as she had been the intimate friend and schoolfellow of 
his only sister, Maria. This marriage took place with the entire 
consent of Mrs Pybus ; but with so vehement an opposition on the 
part of her brother, Mr Charles Pybus (who was a strong politician, 
and one of the Lords of the Admiralty under Mr Pitt), that it pro- 
duced a complete breach between them ; and deprived my father 
and mother of the assistance he might have afforded them on their 
entrance into life. 

Thus detached from the only relation capable of affording her 
any aid, it was lucky that my mother had some fortune ; for my 
father's only contribution towards their future menage (save his own 
talents and character) were six small silver teaspoons, which, from 
much wear, had become the ghosts of their former selves. One 
day, in the^ madness of his joy, he came running into the room, and 
flung them into her lap, saying, " There, Kate, you lucky girl, I 
give you all my fortune ! " 

Upon this small fortune (which my father's first step was to 
secure in the strictest manner to his wife and children, though Mrs 
Pybus, who had perfect confidence in him, had thought it would 
have been much better to leave a portion of it unsettled in case of 
need), and the six silver spoons, they determined to return to Edin- 
burgh and set up housekeeping. 

" One of our early difficulties," said my mother, " was how we 
should buy the necessary plate and linen for our new household ; 
but my dear mother Mrs Pybus's liberality had furnished me with 
the means, by bestowing on me, when I entered the world, my 
sister Lady Fletcher's necklace, consisting of a double row of pearls, 
which were said to be the finest, except Mrs Hastings', that had yet 

been brought to this country. I took them to , and sold them 

for ,£500 ; and all we most wanted was thus obtained. Several years 
after, when visiting the shop with Miss Fox and Miss Vernon, I 
saw in one of the glass cases my own necklace, every pearl of which 
I knew, and had often strung. I had the curiosity to ask the price; 
1 Fifteen hundred pounds,' was the answer. 

My father, though, by his residence in Edinburgh with his pupil, 
thrown out of any immediate employment in the profession he had 
selected, yet took every opportunity of exercising himself in its 
duties, and frequently preached for his friend, Bishop Sandford, at 
the Episcopal Chapel. A few of these sermons, alluding more par- 
ticularly to the moral effects the fearful political events of the times 
were producing on the public mind, he published (in 1800), with a 
short preface, concluding in the following words : — 

"As long as God gives me strength, I will never cease to attack, 
in the way of my profession, and to the best of my abilities, any 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 29 

system of principles injurious to the public happiness, whether 
they be sanctioned by the voice of the many, or whether they be 
not; and may the same God take that unworthy life away when- 
ever I shrink from the contempt and misrepresentations to which 
my duty shall call me to submit." * 

Mr Beach presented my father, soon after his marriage, with 
^750, for his care of Michael ; which sum he put into the funds ; 
and in this consisted his whole worldly wealth. And here I must 
introduce a little trait, which, though trifling in itself, yet, consider- 
ing his circumstances, deserves to be mentioned. • 

My father had made the acquaintance, during his residence in 
Edinburgh, of a family consisting of a lady (one of the most beauti- 
ful specimens of old age I have ever met) and four daughters, who 
seemed to live for no other object than this mother. He accident- 
ally discovered that this interesting old lady was suddenly involved 
in pecuniary difficulties. Regretting how little he had to offer, he 
entreated she would not refuse the loan of a hundred pounds out of 
his little store. It was accepted with the same kind feelings with 
which it was offered. I never heard the circumstance till after his 
death; and I only mention it now because she who received it is 
no more, and those few who survive would, I know, gladly contri- 
bute anything that would do honour to the memory of their old 
friend, Sydney Smith. What added to the generosity of this little 
offering on his part was, that he was then about to become a father, 
and had but little prospect of increasing his means. 

Another instance of his generosity at that time was in behalf of Mr 
Leyden, who, born a poor shepherd boy in Teviotdale, had become 
so remarkable by his learning, that an effort was made by sub- 
scription to enable him to attend the College classes in Edinburgh, 
where he made the most astonishing progress in almost every 
branch of knowledge taught there. Having obtained, through Mr 
Dundas, an appointment to India, his poverty was such that he 
was quite unable to accomplish his outfit. Sir Walter Scott and 
my father, and a few others, were chiefly instrumental in effecting 
it, the latter contributing ^40 out of his very small means. Mr 
Leyden afterwards died in India. 

Of his new pupil William, my father writes in the following 
gratifying terms to his mother, Mrs Beach. 

*' Edinburgh^ Nove?nber 5, 1800. 
" My dear Madam, 
" Since I wrote last, William has made several acquaintance 
with respectable and gentlemanly young men, which I approve of 

* These misrepresentations, though now forgotten, were at that time very numerous 
and very painful to my fr.ther. 



30 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

entirely, and which will afford him amusement and society. He is 
fatter, handsomer, and stouter than he was. Nothing can exceed 
the propriety, politeness, and good humour of his general behaviour 
to everybody in this house ; and I can assure you he is a very great 
— and justly a very great — favourite with us all. . . . We read 
together every night two hours, or longer, as it may happen, and 
talk over what has been done in the day. He writes me an essay 
every week ; all of which, except one, have been done in a very 
superior manner. He is less shy than he was. We had one flood 
of tears the first time I spoke to him with any degree of serious- 
ness ; but upon explaining to him the difference between advice 
and rebuke, and hinting to him that he was too old for this, and 
had outgrown it, it has been quite discontinued. Various articles 
of clothing necessary for his proper appearance in this place have 
been procured ; and I have blown him up to that moderate state 
of coxcomality about his dress, which is popular and becoming in 
a young man. He takes regular exercise, defies the weather, and 
is as hardy as I am from his own choice, and has not had one 
moment of ill-health. 

" These details I enter into for your satisfaction. I would really 
tell you the bad as well as the good, but there is no bad to tell you. 
Ever yours, " Sydney Smith." 

"Edinburgh, November 10, 1801. 
" My dear Sir, 
" I hardly know by what William could be injured. He is, with- 
out any exception, the very best and most gentlemanly young man I 
ever saw, and will be an ornament and comfort to his family ; 
nothing can possibly exceed the excellence of his behaviour in 

every respect. I attribute your silence on the subject of Mr L , 

the attorney, to the goodness of his character ; because I believe 
you would otherwise, as far as you could do so with discretion, 
interest yourself for a poor, respectable clergyman, with a numerous 
and increasing family. You have, I dare say, heard of the event of 
my poor mother's death, which has been cause of great affliction to 
us all. May you very long be preserved from a similar calamity ! 
" Ever, dear Sir, yours sincerely, 

" Sydney Smith." 

Shortly after, alluding to my grandmother Mrs Robert Smith's 
death, for whom my father had the deepest love and veneration, 
he writes to Mrs Beach :— " Many thanks, my dear Madam, for 
your friendly message. Every one* must go to his grave with his 
heart scarred like a soldier's body, — sometimes a parent, some- 
times a child, a friend, a husband, or a wife. Thus the bands of 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 31 

this life are gradually loosened, and death at last is more welcome 
than the comfortless solitude of the world." 

On receiving the news of the madness of the King in 1801, my 
father writes : — 

" What dreadful news, the madness of the king ! And if he 
recovers speedily, we shall hereafter be kept in a constant state of 
alarm. However, I have lived long enough to wait for misfortunes 
till they come, without anticipating them. My poor father will, I 
am sure, lose several ounces of flesh per diem. He grows heavier 
and lighter with every post, and rises and falls with the stocks. 

" You do not say whether you have received the second volume 
of my lethargies, which I desired to be left at the Kirbys', in the 
Strand, for you. I wish I could persuade you to favour me with 
your criticisms ; but that, I am afraid, is almost impossible. With 
my preface I can hardly flatter myself you can agree ; I have some 
thoughts of pursuing the same subject in a much longer essay." 

Speaking of his early domestic arrangements with his young 
wife, my father writes to Mr Beach, who always seems to have 
taken a most kind interest in his household : — 

" Mrs Sydney is quite well, though a little too much harassed by 
the fatigue of coming into a new house. We have secured two 
good servants, a cook and a housemaid, and are looking out 
for another. We have both been very active, and are gradually 
emerging into peace and order. William has taken possession 
of his new apartments, and is, I think, better accommodated 
than last year : he is perfectly well, though I am afraid he finds 
Edinburgh just at present a little dull, a fault which diminishes 
every day. 

"We have been unpleasantly engaged for these two or three 
days past in bidding adieu to some very pleasant families, who are 
quitting the place. All adieus are melancholy ; and principally, I 
believe, because they put us in mind of the last of all adieus, when 
the apothecary, and the heir apparent, and the nurse who weeps 
for pay, surround the bed : when the curate, engaged to dine three 
miles off, mumbles hasty prayers; when the dim eye closes for 
ever in the midst of empty pill-boxes, gallipots, phials, and jugs of 
barley-water. At that time, — a very distant one, I hope, my dear 
Madam, — may the memory of good deeds support you ! " 

In the present day of rapid communication, it is curious to read a 
passage like the following, written in 1801 : — " I am much obliged 
to your intelligence about the King. We are as ignorant of what 
happens in London as if we were in heaven. I shall be obliged to 
you to send me any news about him, — either true or false, I don't 
care which." 



32 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

About this period Lord Holland, with whom my father had been 
slightly acquainted, wrote to ask if he could recommend any clever 
young Scotch medical man to accompany him to Spain, where he 
was going. My father had the pleasure of recommending his friend 
Mr Allen, whose high character and talents were so valued at Hol- 
land House, that he never after left it, but remained there even after 
Lord Holland's death, and died loved, honoured, and respected by 
the whole of Lord Holland's family. 

As the time approached for the birth of his child, my father con- 
stantly expressed his wish, first, that it might be a daughter, and 
secondly, that she might be born with one eye, that he might never 
lose her. The daughter came in due time, according to his wish, 
but, unfortunately, with two eyes. However, in spite of this unpro- 
pitious circumstance, she was very graciously received ; and the 
nurse, to her horror, during five minutes' absence, found he had 
stolen her from the nursery a few hours after she was born, to intro- 
duce her in triumph to Jeffrey and the future Edinburgh Reviewers. 
I find the arrival of his daughter brought with it no little domestic 
trouble and anxiety to my father. — He writes to Mrs Beach : — 

"Edinburgh, March, 1802. 
" My dear Madam, 

" We have had a bad time of it in our nursery. Poor Mrs 
Sydney is almost as weak as she was ten days after her lying-in, 
and is compelled to give up her nursing — a great mortification to 
her, but a sacrifice to absolute necessity. With a set of strange 
servants and in a foreign land, I have been forced to be head nurse 
and head everything ; and my variety of occupations have left me 
but little leisure for correspondence. Thank God, my little girl, 
blessed apparently with an excellent constitution, has defied all the 
bad effects threatened by the mother's weakness. 

"William is going on, as usual, entirely to my satisfaction. He 
evinces a very considerable turn for mathematics ; and, above all, 
a steady, unshaken good conduct in the midst of the liberty I have 
purposely indulged him in. I have always said that the greatest 
object in education is to accustom a young man gradually to be his 
own master. I was glad to understand from you that Michael's 
conduct has given you pleasure. He is a very honest, open-hearted 
young man, and of a very affectionate disposition. 

" Adieu, dear Madam ! I often think with great kindness of my 
friends at Netherhaven, and of their ancient kindness to me in the 
days of my misery. Adieu ! 

"Sydney Smith." 

Being now in possession of a daughter with two eyes ; it became 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 33 

necessary to give her a name ; and nobody would believe the medi- 
tations, the consultations, and the comical discussions he held on 
this important point. At last he determined to invent one, and 
Saba was the result. 

About the period in which my father was engaged in settling this 
important domestic point, he was likewise employed in arranging 
with Messrs Jeffrey, Brougham, Murray, and his other friends, the 
preliminaries of that periodical which, under the name of the " Edin- 
burgh Review," has grown into such importance, has produced such 
useful results, and has bestowed on its chief contributors a European 
reputation. 

He must state its origin and results : — " Towards the end of my 
residence in Edinburgh, Brougham, Jeffrey, and myself happened 
to meet in the eighth or ninth story or flat in Buccleuch Place, the 
then elevated residence of Mr Jeffrey. I proposed that we should 
set up a Review. This was acceded to with acclamation. I was 
appointed editor, and remained long enough in Edinburgh to edit 
the first number of the Review. The motto I proposed for the Re- 
view was, ' Tenui Musam meditamur avend' — ' We cultivate litera- 
ture on a little oatmeal. 5 But this was too near the truth to be 
admitted ; so we took our present grave motto from Publius Syrus, 
of whom none of us had, I am sure, read a single line ; and so 
began what has since turned out to be a very important and able 
journal. When I left Edinburgh it fell into the stronger hands of 
Lords Jeffrey and Brougham and reached the highest point of 
popularity and success."* 

u To appreciate the value of the Edinburgh Review, the state of 
England at the period when that journal began should be had in 
remembrance. The Catholics were not emancipated. The Cor- 
poration and Test Acts were unrepealed. The Game-laws were 
horribly oppressive ; steel-traps and spring-guns were set all over 
the country ; prisoners tried for their lives could have no counsel. 
Lord Eldon and the Court of Chancery pressed heavily on man- 
kind. Libel was punished by the most cruel and vindictive im- 
prisonments. The principles of political economy were little 
understood.! The laws of debt and conspiracy were upon the worst 

• A distinguished periodical, speaking of the Edinburgh Review, says : — " The world 
will long look to this as the opening of an important era in English literary history; for 
then, so to say, was founded an empire of criticism, wider in its objects, more vigorous 
in its provisions, more perfect in its administrative machinery, than any of the dynasty 
which had flourished in the eighteenth century. The cause of tolerance without licen- 
tiousness, and philanthropy without cant, was substantially aided by its exertions and 
the attention they commanded. If the good done thereby should be apportioned out, a 
large share would fall to the Rev. Sydney Smith." 

t "In a scarcity which occurred little more than twenty years ago, every judge (ex- 
cept the Chancellor and Sergeant Runnington), when they charged the Grand Jury, at« 

c 



34 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

footing. The enormous wickedness of the slave-trade was tolerated. 
A thousand evils were in existence, which the talents of good and 
able men have since lessened or removed ; and these efforts have 
been not a little assisted by the honest boldness of the Edinburgh 
Review." 

To estimate justly my father's moral courage in projecting and 
contributing to such a Review, not only the personal risk to which 
those who expressed liberal opinions were exposed (of which nothing 
gives a more vivid impression than the third volume of Mr Fox's 
letters, just published) should be taken into consideration, but his 
profession, and the corrupt state of that profession at this period. 
As this is a subject of which I am quite incompetent to speak, I 
shall quote a short passage from a remarkable article on Church 
Parties in the Edinburgh Review which gives a very striking 
description of it. " The thermometer of the Church of England 
sank to its lowest point in the first thirty years of George III. Un- 
believing Bishops, and a slothful Clergy, had succeeded in driving 
from the Church the faith and zeal of Methodism which Wesley 
had organised within her pale. The spirit was expelled, and the 
dregs remained. That was the age when jobbery and corruption, 
long supreme in the State, had triumphed over the virtue of the 
Church ; when the money-changers not only entered the temple, 
but drove out the worshippers ; when ecclesiastical revenues were 
monopolised by wealthy pluralists ; when the name of curate lost 
its legal meaning, and, instead of denoting the incumbent of a 
living, came to signify the deputy of an absentee," 

The Dean of St Paul's and others have spoken of the remarkable 
increase in vigour of style and boldness of illustration in my father's 
writings as he advanced in years ; but I have seldom seen it noticed, 
except in a very clever sketch of him written by some friend soon 
after his death, that he had no youth in his writings ; no period of 
those crude, extravagant theoretical opinions, with which the 
French Revolution had infected society to a degree of which we 
can hardly now form any estimate ; though it is alluded to in almost 
every publication of the times. 

A letter from Mr Montague to Mr Mackintosh, given in the Life 
of his father Sir James Mackintosh, describes this vividly. "At 
this time, the wild opinions which prevailed at the commencement 
of the French Revolution misled most of us who were not as wise 
as your father, and he did not wholly escape their fascinating influ- 
ence. The prevalent doctrines were, that man was so benevolent 
as to wish only the happiness of his fellow-creatures, so intellectual 
as to be able readily to discover what was best, and so far above 

tributed the scarcity to the combinations of the farmers. Such doctrines would not now 
be tolerated in the mouth of a school-boy." 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 35 

the power of temptation as never to be drawn by any allurements 
from the paths of virtue. Gratitude was said to be a vice, marriage 
an improper restraint, law an imposition, and lawyers aiders of 
fraud. It is scarcely possible to conceive the extensive influence 
which these visions had on society." 

"Yet in the midst of this" (continues the writer to whom I have 
alluded) " Sydney Smith showed, from the outset, a singular union 
of courage and good sense, without a tincture of the extravagance 
by which, in so many young men of ability, they were at that time 
accompanied. He did not hesitate to embrace and avow a sound 
principle, however obnoxious ; but neither enthusiasm nor party 
spirit could carry him a hair's-breath beyond what his judgment 
approved." 

He seems to have discerned, in the first blush of youth, that true 
liberty was never in such danger of destruction as when seized by 
the rude hands of her intemperate and unenlightened worshippers ; 
and that true religion was never in such peril of being brought into 
ridicule and contempt, as when disfigured by the indiscreet zeal 
of ignorance and fanaticism. These convictions will, I think, be 
seen to pervade all his works, and even his correspondence ; — to 
have been the great incentives under which he laboured to open 
the eyes of our rulers, under which he endeavoured to promote 
reforms at their legitimate source, and to ward off those horrors 
which the long neglect of reform had so recently produced in 
France. Speaking of reforms, in one of his early letters, he says : — 
" What I want to see the State do, is to listen in these sad times to 
some of its numerous enemies. Why not do something for the 
Catholics, and scratch them off the list ? then the Dissenters, a 
mitigation of the Game laws, &c, anything that would show the 
Government to the people in some other attitude than that of tax- 
ing, punishing, and restraining." And in the same spirit he says, 
in one of the sermons he preached during his residence in Edin- 
burgh : — " In the name of God, as you tremble at retributive 
justice ; and in the name of mankind, if mankind are dear to you ; 
seek not that easy and accursed fame which is gathered in the 
work of revolutions ; and deem it better to be for ever unknown, 
than found a momentary name upon the basis of anarchy and irre- 
ligion." My father had the more merit in maintaining this moder- 
ation on subjects which he evidently felt so strongly, as he writes 
to his friend Lord Jeffrey : — " I envy you your sense, your style, and 
the good temper with which you attack prejudices that drive me 
almost to the limits of insanity." 

It is curious, in going through his writings, to observe that there 
is scarcely any one principle he has advocated, with the exception 
of the payment of the Catholic clergy, that has not been granted 



36 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

bit by bit ; and, as my father says, after many throes and strug- 
gles and hard-fought battles, that justice has been reluctantly con- 
ceded in the midst of fear and degradation, often when it was too 
late ; which, had it been yielded in times of peace and strength, 
would have prevented many of the miseries the last forty years 
have witnessed in Ireland, and the many turmoils that have at 
various times agitated this country, and placed it on the verge of 
revolution. " In this way peace was concluded with America, and 
emancipation granted to the Catholics ; and in this way the war of 
complexion will be finished in the West Indies." And again, he 
says : — " Most of the concessions which have been given to Ireland 
have been given in fear. Ireland would have been lost to this 
country, if the British Legislature had not, with all the rapidity and 
precipitation of the truest panic, passed those Acts which Ireland 
did not ask, but demanded, in the times of her armed association." 
Yet now these measures are so confirmed by the general sanction 
of society, that it seems almost trite and commonplace to allude to 
them. 

I shall leave my father to paint the fate of those who ventured 
to maintain such opinions at the period of which I am speaking. 

"From the beginning of the century (about which time the 
Review began), to the death of Lord Liverpool, was an awful period 
for those who ventured to maintain liberal opinions ; and who 
were too honest to sell them for the ermine of the judge, or the 
lawn of the prelate. A long and hopeless career in your profession, 
the chuckling grin of noodles, the sarcastic leer of the genuine 
political rogue ; prebendaries, deans, bishops made over your head ; 
reverend renegades advanced to the highest dignities of the Church 
for helping to rivet the fetters of Catholic and Protestant Dissenters; 
and no more chance of a Whig administration than of a thaw in 
Zembla. These were the penalties exacted for liberality of opinion 
at that period ; and not only was there no pay, but there were 
many stripes." 

" It is always considered a piece of impertinence in England if 
a man of less than two or three thousand a year has any opinions 
at all on important subjects ; and in addition he was sure to be 
assailed with all the Billingsgate of the French Revolution. Jacobin, 
leveller, atheist, Socinian, incendiary, regicide, were the gentlest 
appellations used ; and any man who breathed a syllable against 
the senseless bigotry of the two Georges, or hinted at the abomin- 
able tyranny and persecution exercised against Catholic Ireland, 
was shunned as unfit for the relations of social life. Not a murmur 
against any abuse was permitted. To say a word against the 
suitorcide delays of the Court of Chancery,* or the cruel punish- 

* He says, on this subject, in his speech on the Reform Bill :— "Look at the gigantic 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 37 

ments of the Game-laws, or against any abuse which a rich man 
inflicted and the poor man suffered, was treason against the plou- 
siocracy, and was bitterly and steadily resented. Lord Grey had 
not then taken off the bearing-rein from the English people, as Sir 
Francis Head has new done from horses." 

My father speaks of himself as having a passionate love of 
common justice and common sense. He says, speaking of justice, 
" Truth is its handmaid, freedom is its child, peace is its companion, 
safety walks in its steps, victory follows in its train ; it is the 
brightest emanation from the Gospel, it is the greatest attribute of 
God. It is that centre round which human motives and passions 
turn ; and justice, sitting on high, sees genius, and power, and 
wealth, and birth revolving round her throne, and teaches their 
paths, and marks out their orbits, and warns with a loud voice, and 
rules with a strong hand, and carries order and discipline into a 
world which but for her would be a wild waste of passions." 

Entering life then with these feelings, we shall, I think, best find 
their fruits by following the efforts of his pen through the greater 
part of his life in the Edinburgh Review. I' have been told that I 
ought to give some analysis of them here. But they are now before 
the public in such various forms, are so well known, and, after various 
trials, I find them so much injured by any attempt to condense them, 
that I shall make his friend, Lord Monteagle, speak for me ; as he 
states in a few lines what it would have cost me many pages to tell. 
I shall therefore content myself with shortly enumerating what were 
the subjects that occupied my father's thoughts and employed his pen 
during so large a portion of his life ; a pen which, I think I may 
venture to assert, was never sullied by private passion or private 
interest, never degraded by an impure or unworthy motive ; and 
which, with all its unexampled powers of sarcasm, never wounded 
but for the public good. 

Lord Monteagle says : — " Looking at all he did, and the way in 
which he did it, it must be an inexpressible pleasure to all who 
knew, valued, and loved him, to observe that there was scarcely 
one question in which the moral, the intellectual, social, or even 
physical well-being of his fellow-men were concerned, to the ad- 
vancement of which he has not endeavoured to contribute." 

Brougham, sworn in at twelve, and before six o'clock has a bill on the table abolishing 
the abuses of a court which has been the curse of England for centuries. For twenty- 
five long years did Lord Eldon sit in the court, surrounded with misery and sorrow, 
which he never held up a finger to alleviate. The widow and the orphan cried to him 
as vainly as the town-crier cries when he offers a small reward for a full purse. The 
bankrupt of the court became the lunatic of the court ; estates mouldered away, and 
mansions fell down, but the fees came in and all was well ; but in an instant the iroo 
mace of Brougham shivered to atoms this hou?e of fraud and of delay." 



38 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Some of his earliest efforts seem to have been directed to subjects 
more immediately belonging to his profession, such as the use and 
abuse of the pulpit for political subjects, and the very inefficient state 
of pulpit eloquence. He touches on clerical reforms ; he endeavours 
to protect the curates and inferior clergy, and to restrain the in- 
creasing power of the bishops ; or rather to define those powers by 
laws, not leaving them dependent on the caprice of individual 
character or prejudice, as they then were. Toleration, from every 
motive, private, political, and religious, he inculcates on all occa- 
sions and in every form ; and as connected with and mainly de- 
pending on this, no subject more earnestly or frequently occupied 
his thoughts than the state of Ireland. 

Education, as existing in this country in every class and in both 
sexes, claimed his attention. The injurious effects of Methodism 
and fanaticism on true religion in this country ; the infinite im- 
portance of correcting vice in such a manner as should not produce 
hatred to virtue ; the danger of religious wars, or of the total loss 
of our Indian possessions from the injudicious attempts at conver- 
sion by men totally unfitted for so important a work ; the injuries 
we were inflicting on some of our finest colonies by bad governors 
and worse laws, — all these he describes and deprecates. He found 
in the cell of the lunatic chains, darkness, terror, cruelty, everything 
that unrestrained power and human passions could add of horror 
to that heaviest of God's afflictions ; and he brought into public 
notice the mild and humane treatment of the Quakers and its 
beneficial effects. He examined the state of our gaols ; he read 
the reports of good and laborious men who had dedicated much 
time and attention to the subject, but men whom "the fat and sleek 
people, the enjoyers, the mumpsimus, the well-as- we-are people of 
the world," had contrived to keep down and hide from the public 
eye. He endeavoured to convince the unsuspecting part of the 
world, that we were paying and nourishing in every county of Eng- 
land a public school for the instruction and encouragement of 
profligacy and vice : no order, no division, no public eye ; the 
innocent with the guilty ; youth just tottering on the threshold of 
sin, living with and learning from the most hardened profligates ; 
punishments inflicted before trial at the caprice of the magistrate 
or governor ; and many other evils, moral as well as physical, 
which it only wanted the public eye and public attention to correct 
and improve. 

At a time when the greater part of the Bench, as well as the Bar, 
with some noble exceptions, were opposed strongly to any change 
in our criminal procedure, he looked with horror at the scenes he 
witnessed in our courts of law, and the judicial murders that he felt 
must often occur under such a system ; and he pleaded the cause 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 39 

of the poor unprotected prisoner in language so earnest and so 
forcible, that it may, I hope, entitle him to share with his great 
friends, Sir S. Romilly and Sir J. Mackintosh, the merit of having 
aided in that work of mercy for which they fought so long and so ably, 
and for which the prisoner yet unborn may live to bless their names. 

Though living in the midst of large landed proprietors, all zealous 
in the preservation of their game, the cruelty, injustice, and increas- 
ing severity of the Game-laws, and their oppressive and demoralis- 
ing effects on the poor, frequently occupied his attention and excited 
his most earnest opposition.* The perplexing, but, as he says, most 
trite of subjects, the Poor-laws, occupied his thoughts ; though, I 
fear, with as little result as has generally been produced by all the 
thought that has been expended on this most difficult question. 

" Thinking (as he says) the United States the most magnificent 
picture of human happiness," and feeling the importance of the 
great political experiments that were going on there, he endeavoured 
to bring forward and attract public attention both to their merits 
and defects ; urging America not to abuse the advantages she 
possessed ; inciting Europe to profit by the example she set ; and 
concluding by warning her, in a well-known passage, against a taste 
for military glory. 

These, I think, were amongst the most important subjects he 
treated of; but there were many others of a lighter character, 
which he handled always with the same objects in view — to pro- 
mote truth and expose evil. He leads us amusingly through the 
tvanderings of Waterton ; he unmasks the mischievous sophistry 
of Madame de StaeTs " Delphine ;" he shows the comparatively in- 
nocuous effects which the plain, unvarnished exposure of vice in 
"Anastasius " was calculated to produce ; he points out the truth 
of the social picture given in " Granby ;" he acts as middle-man to 
Bentham ; he brings out to public notice, from the mass of blue- 
books under which they were buried, all the cruelties to which the 
poor climbing-boys were exposed in sweeping chimneys ; he points 
out the utility of the Hamiltonian system in diminishing the long 
and valuable period of time sacrificed in our places of education to 
acquiring a knowledge of the learned languages. There are some 
few others which he has not republished, thinking them no longer 
of any general interest. 

I am anxious, in this sketch, not to be thought to attribute an 
undue share of influence to my father's efforts for the public good. 
It is often difficult to say who gave the death-blow to an abuse ; 
and my father's blows, all will admit, were no light ones where they 
fell. Yet he was but one of the many wise men who have used 

* In the course of the preceding year no Xewer than 12,000 persons were committed for 
offences against the Game-laws. 



4o MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

their talents for the benefit of their fellow-creatures ; and many 
have devoted more time and attention to these objects than he, 
from his position, was enabled to do. But I think he has one 
peculiarity above almost any writer of his day, — that of attracting 
public attention. He was born for a teacher of the people ; and, as 
Lord Ashburton says in his striking address to schoolmasters, " I 
wish to familiarise to the youngest amongst you this important 
truth, that no knowledge, however profound, can constitute a 
teacher. A teacher must have knowledge, as an orator must have 
knowledge, as a builder must have materials ; but as, in choosing 
the builder of my house, I do not select the man who has the most 
materials in his yard, but I proceed to select him by reference to 
his skill, ingenuity, and taste ; so also, in testing an orator or a 
teacher, I satisfy myself that they fulfil the comparatively easy 
condition of possessing sufficient materials of knowledge with which 
to work ; I look then to those high and noble qualities which are 
the characteristics of their peculiar calling. There were hundreds 
at Athens who knew more than Demosthenes, many more that 
knew more at Rome than Cicero, but there was but one Demos- 
thenes and one Cicero." So I think, though there are hundreds 
who have known more, laboured more, thought more, in England, 
yet in our day there was but one Sydney Smith. 

He was a sort of rough-rider of a subject ; sometimes originating, 
but more frequently taking up what others had for years been 
stating humbly, or timidly, or obscurely, or lengthily, or imper- 
fectly, or dully, to the world ; extracting at once its essence, un- 
veiling the motives of his opponents, and placing his case clearly, 
concisely, simply, eloquently, boldly, brightly, before the public 
eye. Thus the subject became read, thought of, discussed, and 
often acted upon by thousands of persons, dispersed over various 
parts of the world. This cannot have been without powerful influ- 
ence on the opinions and conduct of society. 

The peculiar talent possessed by my father is well described in a 
sketch by a personal friend of considerable talent, printed at the 
time of his death. 

" In fact, he had read much, and always with the sincerest 
desire to arrive at truth ; and if he lacked that quality of intellect 
which is capable of imparting original views on profound subjects, 
no man was ever more successful in possessing himself of the 
results of other men's thoughts, and in diffusing them in a form 
suited to the apprehension of ordinary readers. A distinguished 
scholar now living, writing of Sydney Smith to a friend in 1840, 
observes : — ' Ridicule seems to me to be admirably fitted to con- 
found fools and to destroy their prejudices. It is not needed in 
order to recommend truth to wise men, and indeed, from its 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 41 

generally dealing in exaggeration and slight misrepresentation, is 
likely to offend them. It is his mastery of ridicule which renders 
Sydney Smith so powerful as a diffuser of ideas, for in order to 
diffuse widely it is necessary to be able to address fools. His 
powers as a diffuser, as compared with the powers of a great in- 
ventor, who was latterly altogether wanting in the diffusing power, 
are well shown in his article on Bentham's " Book of Fallacies ;" 
indeed, as a diffuser of the good ideas of other men, I do not know 
whether he ever had an equal/ 

" When the imaginative faculty was in question, however, Sydney 
Smith was creative and original enough, God knows. When in 
good spirits, the exuberance of his fancy showed itself in the most 
fantastic images and most ingenious absurdities, till his hearers 
and himself were at times fatigued with the merriment they excited. 
He had the art, too, of divesting personalities of vulgarity, and not 
unfrequently was the object of his wit seen to enjoy the exercise of 
it quite as much as others ; in fact, many persons rather felt it as 
a compliment when Sydney singled them out for sport." 

In another sketch of my father's writings I have met with this 
passage, which I think so just that I shall insert it. 

" Few men could write with his disregard of common forms, and 
his perfect expression of individual peculiarities, without falling 
into coarseness or buffoonery. The writings of Sydney are free 
from all vulgarities usual to the familiar writer. The great pecu- 
liarity of his works is their singular blending of the beautiful with 
the ludicrous, and this is the source of his refinement. He is keen 
and personal, almost fierce and merciless, in his attacks on public 
abuses ; he has no check on his humour from authority or conven- 
tional forms, and yet he very rarely violates good taste ; there is 
much good-humour in him in spite of his severity : it would be 
difficult to point out the source of this power of fascination, but it 
strikes us as being different from anything else we have ever 



CHAPTER III. 

Extracts from Lectures — Preface to Sermons — Analysis of Sermons— Sermon for the 
Blind— Returns to Edinburgh— Takes Pupils— Illness of Daughter — Moral Courage 
— Studies Medicine and Moral Philosophy. 

I have endeavoured in the last chapter (with as little commentary 
as possible) to give a short sketch of the most important subjects 
that occupied my father's thoughts, and employed his pen, during 
twenty-eight years of his life, in the Edinburgh Review. 

But to perform my task properly, I ought perhaps to add some 
account of the subject-matter of his lectures and sermons. The 
analysis of the former, if made at all, must be done by an abler pen 
than mine. I shall therefore content myself with two extracts only. 
The first has often been quoted, not only for its beauty, but as 
affording a specimen of the high moral tone which pervades these 
lectures. The second was extracted by one of his earliest college 
associates (and, I believe, now oldest friend alive), Mr Duncan ; 
and sent to my mother, as giving what he thought the best descrip- 
tion of my father that has ever been written. The first is from the 
Lecture "On the Conduct of the Understanding;" the second is 
from that on " Wit and Humour." 

" Therefore, when I say, in conducting the understanding, love 
knowledge with a great love, with a vehement love, with a love 
coeval with life, what do I say but love innocence, love virtue, love 
purity of conduct, love that which, if you are rich and powerful, 
will sanctify the blind fortune which has made you so, and make 
men call it justice ? Love that which, if you are poor, will render 
your poverty respectable, and make the proudest feel it unjust to 
laugh at the meanness of your fortunes. Love that which will 
comfort and adorn you, and never quit you, which will open to you 
the kingdom of thought, and all the boundless regions of conception, 
as an asylum against the cruelty, the injustice, and the pain that 
may be your lot in this outward world ; that which will make your 
motives habitually great and honourable, and light up in an instant 
a thousand noble disdains at the very thought of meanness and of 
fraud. 

" Therefore, if any young man has embarked his life in the pursuit 
of knowledge, let him go on without doubting or fearing the event; 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 43 

let him not be intimidated by the cheerless beginnings of knowledge, 
by the darkness from which she springs, by the difficulties which 
hover around her, by the wretched habitation in which she dwells, 
by the want and sorrow which sometimes journey in her train. 
But let him ever follow her as an angel that guards him, and as 
the genius of his life. She will bring him out at last into the light 
of day, and exhibit him to the world, comprehensive in acquire- 
ments, fertile in resources, rich in imagination, strong in reasoning, 
prudent and powerful above his fellows in all the relations and in 
all the offices of life." 

" The meaning of an extraordinary man is, that he is eight men, 
not one man ; that he has as much wit as if he had no sense, and 
as much sense as if he had no wit ; that his conduct is as judicious 
as if he were the dullest of human beings, and his imagination as 
brilliant as if he were irretrievably ruined. But when wit is com- 
bined with sense and information ; when it is softened by benevo- 
lence and restrained by principle ; when it is in the hands of a man 
who can use it and despise it ; who can be witty and something 
more than witty ; who loves humour, justice, decency, good nature, 
morality, and religion ten thousand times better than wit, wit is 
then a beautiful and delightful part of our nature. 

" Genuine and innocent wit like this is surely the flavour of the 
mind. Man could direct his ways by plain reason, and support his 
life by tasteless food ; but God has given us wit, and flavour, and 
brightness, and laughter, and perfumes, to enliven the days of 
man's pilgrimage, and to charm his pained steps over the burning 
marie." 

The character and design of his Sermons will perhaps be best 
explained by a short preface he published as early as the year 1801, 
but never reprinted ; explaining his reasons for the course he has 
taken ; then showing what that course has been, and giving a few 
extracts from his sermons. 

" He who publishes sermons should explain whether he publishes 
speeches, or essays, or what it is he does publish ; for metaphysical 
dissertations, theological polemics, Scripture criticism, historical 
disquisition, and moral and religious doctrine, and exhortation, are 
all included under the appellation of sermons. Now every work 
should be tried by the intentions with which it was written. A 
moral sermon, delivered before a mixed audience of both sexes, 
would be very bad, if it contained a profound analysis of human 
motives and actions ; and such an analysis should never be at- 
tempted before a mixed audience, because a continued attention to 



44 MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 

a difficult subject is a very rare quality, which the habits of the 
mass of mankind can never lead them to acquire. Before such 
an audience all these sermons were delivered, and whoever does 
me the honour of judging of them at all, will, I hope, do me the 
justice of judging them with a relation to this circumstance. 

" The clergy have at all times complained of the decay of piety, 
in language similar to that which they now hold from the pulpit. 
The best way of bringing this declamation to proof is to look into 
the inside of our churches, and to remark how they are attended. In 
London, I dare say, there are full seven-tenths of the whole popu- 
lation who hardly ever enter a place of worship from one end- of the 
year to the other. At the fashionable end of the town the congre- 
gations are almost wholly made up of ladies, and there is an ap- 
pearance of listlessness, indifference, and impatience, very little 
congenial to our theoretical ideas of a place of worship. In the 
country villages half of the parishioners do not go to church at 
all, and almost all, with the exception of the sick and old, are in a 
state of wretched ignorance and indifference with regard to aD 
religious opinions whatever. 

" The clergy of a district in the diocese of Lincoln associated 
lately for the purpose of forming an estimate of the state of religon 
within their own limits. The amount of the population where the 
inquiry was set on foot, was 15,042. It was found that the average 
number of the ordinary congregations was 4933, and of communi- 
cants at each sacrament 1808 ; so that not one in three attended 
divine service, nor one in six of the adults (who amounted to 1 1,282) 
partook of the Sacrament. 

" Though other grave and important causes have unquestionably 
contributed very largely to produce this indifference, which is by 
no means necessarily connected with infidelity, still, I am afraid, 
it must in some little degree be attributed to our form of worship, 
and to the clergy themselves. 

" That the attention of the greater part of an audience can be 
be kept up, through many repetitions, in a service that lasts an 
hour and a half, or an hour and three quarters, is as much to be 
wished as it is to be little expected. Piety, stretched beyond a 
certain point, is the parent of impiety. By attempting to keep up 
the fervour of devotion for so long a time, we have thinned our 
churches, and driven away those fluctuating, lukewarm Christians 
who will always outnumber the zealous and devout, and whom it 
should be our first object to animate, allure, and fix. 

"The English clergy, though upon the whole a very learned, pious, 
moral, and decent body of men, are not very remarkable for profes- 
sional activity ; and when they have discharged the formal and ex- 
acted duties of religion, are not very forwaid, by gratuitous inspec- 



-MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 45 

tion and remonstrance, to keep alive and diffuse a due sense of re- 
ligion in their parishioners. 

" To these causes may be added the low state of pulpit eloquence. 

" Preaching has become a by-word for long and dull conversation 
of any kind ; and whoever wishes to imply, in any piece of writing, 
the absence of everything agreeable and inviting, calls it a sermon. 

" One reason for this is the bad choice of subjects for the pulpit. 
The clergy are allowed about twenty-six hours every year for the 
instruction of their fellow-creatures : and I cannot help thinking 
this short time had better be employed on practical subjects, 
in explaining and enforcing that conduct which the spirit of Christi- 
anity requires, and which mere worldly happiness commonly coin- 
cides to recommend. These are the topics nearest the heart, which 
make us more fit for this and a better world, and do all the good 
that sermons ever will do. Critical explanations of difficult passages 
of Scripture, dissertations on the doctrinal and mysterious points of 
religion, learned investigations of the meaning and accomplishment 
of prophecies, do well for publication, but are ungenial to the habits 
and taste of a general audience. Of the highest importance they 
are to those who can defend the faith and study it profoundly; but, 
God forbid it should be necessary to be a scholar, or a critic, in 
order to be a Christian. To the multitude, whether elegant or vul- 
gar, the result only of erudition, employed for the defence of Chris- 
tianity, can be of any consequence : with the erudition itself they 
cannot meddle, and must be fatigued if they are doomed to hear it. 
In every congregation there are a certain number whom principle, 
old age, or sickness has rendered truly devout ; but in preaching, 
as in everything else, the greater number of instances constitute the 
rule, and the lesser the exception. 

" A distinction is set up, with the usual inattention to the mean- 
ing of words, between moral and religious subjects of discourse ; 
as if every moral subject must not necessarily be a Christian subject. 
If Christianity concern itself with our present, as well as our future 
happiness, how can any virtue, or the doctrine which inculcates it, 
be considered as foreign to our sacred religion ? Has our Saviour 
forbidden justice, — proscribed mercy, benevolence, and good faith? 
or, when we state the more sublime motives for their cultivation, 
which we derive from revelation, why are we not to display the 
temporal motives also, and to give solidity to elevation by fixing 
piety upon interest? 

" There is a bad taste in the language of sermons evinced by a 
constant repetition of the same scriptural phrases, which perhaps 
were used with great judgment two hundred years ago, but are now 
become so trite that they may, without any great detriment, be ex- 
changed for others. ' Putting off the old man — and putting on the 



4C MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

new man/ ' The one thing needful/ ' The Lord hath set up his 
candlestick/ ' The armour of righteousness/ &c. &c. &c. &c. The 
sacred Scriptures are surely abundant enough to afford us the same 
idea with some novelty of language : we can never be driven, from 
the penury of these writings, to wear and fritter their holy language 
into a perfect cant, which passes through the ear without leaving 
any impression. 

" To this cause of the unpopularity of sermons may be added the 
extremely ungraceful manner in which they are delivered. The 
English, generally remarkable for doing very good things in a very 
bad manner, seem to have reserved the maturity and plenitude of 
their awkwardness for the pulpit. A clergyman clings to his velvet 
cushion with either hand, keeps his eye riveted upon his book, 
speaks of the ecstacies of joy and fear with a voice and a face 
which indicate neither, and pinions his body and soul into the 
same attitude of limb and thought, for fear of being called theatrical 
and affected. The most intrepid veteran of us all dares no more 
than wipe his face with his cambric sudarium ; if, by mischance, 
his hand slip from its orthodox gripe of the velvet, he draws it back 
as from liquid brimstone, or the caustic iron of the law, and atones 
for this indecorum by fresh inflexibility and more rigorous same- 
ness. Is it wonder, then, that every semi-delirious sectary who 
pours forth his animated nonsense with the genuine look and voice 
of passion should gesticulate away the congregation of the most 
profound and learned divine of the Established Church, and in two 
Sundays preach him bare to the very sexton ? Why are we natural 
everywhere but in the pulpit ? No man expresses warm and ani- 
mated feelings anywhere else, with his mouth alone, but with his 
whole body ; he articulates with every limb, and talks from head to 
foot with a thousand voices. Why this holoplexia on sacred occa- 
sions alone? Why call in the aid of paralysis to piety? Is it a 
rule of oratory to balance the style against the subject, and to 
handle the most sublime truths in the dullest language and the 
driest manner? Is sin to be taken from men, as Eve was from 
Adam, by casting them into a deep slumber ? Or from what pos- 
sible perversion of common sense are we all to look like field- 
preachers in Zembla, holy lumps of ice, numbed into quiescence, 
and stagnation, and mumbling ? 

" It is theatrical to use action, and it is Methodistical to use 
action. 

" But we have cherished contempt for sectaries, and persevered 
in dignified tameness so long, that while we are freezing common 
sense for large salaries in stately churches, amidst whole acres and 
furlongs of empty pews, the crowd are feasting on ungrammatical 
fervour and illiterate animation in the crumbling hovels of 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 47 

Methodists. If influence over the imagination can produce these 
powerful effects ; if this be the chain by which the people are 
dragged captive at the wheel of enthusiasm, why are we, who are 
rocked in the cradle of ancient genius, who hold in one hand the 
book of the wisdom of God, and in the other grasp that eloquence 
which ruled the Pagan world, why are we never to rouse, to appeal, 
to inflame, to break through every barrier, up to the very haunts 
and chambers of the soul ? If the vilest interest upon earth can 
daily call forth all the powers of the mind, are we to harangue on 
public order and public happiness, to picture a re-uniting world, a 
resurrection of souls, a rekindling of ancient affections, the dying 
day of heaven and of earth, and to unveil the throne of God, with a 
wretched apathy which we neither feel nor show in the most trifling 
concerns of life ? This surely can be neither decency nor piety, 
but ignorant shame, boyish bashfulness, luxurious indolence, or 
anything but propriety and sense. There is, I grant, something 
discouraging at present to a man of sense in the sarcastical phrase 
of popular preacher ; but I am not entirely without hope that the 
time may come when energy in the pulpit will be no longer con- 
sidered as a mark of superficial understanding ; when animation 
and affectation will be separated ; when churches will cease (as 
Swift says) to be public dormitories ; and sleep be no longer looked 
upon as the most convenient vehicle of good sense. 

" I know well that out of ten thousand orators by far the greater 
number must be bad, or none could be good ; but by becoming 
sensible of the mischief we have done, and are doing, we may all 
advance a proportional step ; the worst may become what the best 
are, and the best better. 

" There is always a want of grandeur in attributing great events 
to little causes ; but this is in some small degree compensated for 
by truth. I am convinced we should do no great injury to the 
cause ot religion if we remembered the old combination of arce et 
foci, and kept our churches a little warmer. An experienced clergy- 
man can pretty well estimate the number of his audience by the 
indications of a sensible thermometer. The same blighting wind 
chills piety which is fatal to vegetable life ; yet our power of en- 
countering weather varies with the object of our hardihood; we are 
very Scythians when pleasure is concerned, and Sybarites when the 
bell summons us to church. 

" No reflecting man can ever wish to adulterate manly piety (the 
parent of all that is good in the world) with mummery and parade. 
But we are strange, very strange creatures, and it is better perhaps 
not to place too much confidence in our reason alone. If anything, 
there is, perhaps, too little pomp and ceremony in our worship, in- 
stead of too much. We quarrelled with the Roman Catholic 



48 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Church, in a great hurry and a great passion, and furious with 
spleen ; clothed ourselves with sackcloth, because she was habited 
in brocade ; rushing, like children, from one extreme to another, 
and blind to all medium between complication and barrenness, 
formality and neglect. I am very glad to find we are calling in 
more and more the aid of music to our service. In London, where 
it can be commanded, good music has a prodigious effect in filling 
a church ; organs have been put up in various churches in the 
country, and, as I have been informed, with the best possible effect. 
Of what value, it may be asked, are auditors who come there from 
such motives ? But our first business seems to be, to bring them 
there from any motive which is not undignified and ridiculous, and 
then to keep them there from a good one : those who come for 
pleasure may remain for prayer. 

" Pious and worthy gentlemen are ever apt to imagine that man- 
kind are what they ought to be ; to mistake the duty for the fact ; 
to suppose that religion can never weary its votaries ; that the same 
novelty and ornament which are necessary to enforce every tem- 
poral doctrine are wholly superfluous in religious admonition ; and 
that the world at large consider religion as the most important of 
all concerns, merely because it is so ; whereas, if we refer to facts, 
the very reverse appears to be the case. Every consideration in- 
fluences the mind in a compound ratio of the importance of the 
effects which it involves and their proximity. A man who was sure 
to die a death of torture in ten years would think more of the most 
trifling gratification or calamity of the day than of his torn flesh and 
twisted nerves years hence. If we were to read the gazette of a 
naval victory from the pulpit we should be dazzled with the eager 
eyes of our audience ; they would sit through an earthquake to 
hear us. The cry of a child, the fall of a book, the most trifling 
occurrence, is sufficient to dissipate religious thought, and to intro- 
duce a more willing train of ideas ; a sparrow fluttering about the 
church is an antagonist which the most profound theologian in 
Europe is wholly unable to overcome. A clergyman has so little 
previous disposition to attention in his favour, that, without the 
utmost efforts, he can neither excite it or preserve it when excited. 
It is his business to awaken mankind by every means in his power, 
and to show them their true interest. If he despise energy of 
manner and labour of composition, from a conviction that his 
audience are willing, and that his subject alone will support him, 
he will only add lethargy to languor, and confirm the drowsiness of 
his hearers by becoming a great example of sleep himself. 

" That many greater causes are at work to undermine religion I 
seriously believe ; but I shall probably be laughed at when I say 
that warm churches, solemn music, animated pre?.ching upon 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 49 

practical subjects, and a service some little abridged, would be no 
(contemptible seconds to the just, necessary, and innumerable in- 
vectives which have been levelled against Rousseau, Voltaire, 
D'Alembert, and the whole pandemonium of those martyrs to 
Atheism who toiled with such laborious malice, and suffered odium 
with such inflexible profligacy, for the wretchedness and despair of 
their fellow-creatures. 

" I have merely expressed what appears to me to be the truth in 
these remarks. I hope I shall not give offence ; I am sure I do 
not mean to do it. Some allowance should be made for the 
severity of censure when the provident satirist furnishes the raw 
material for his own art, and commits every fault which he 
blames." 

Entering on his ministry, then, with these views, we shall, I 
think, find that my father's religion is tinctured, in great measure 
by his character — it has nothing intolerant, repulsive, or morose in 
his hands. He first seeks to inspire the love of God by painting 
the world overflowing with beauties of form, colour, sight, taste, 
smell, feeling ; the mind of man filled with genius, fancy, wit, 
imagination, eloquence, — properties and feelings totally unnecessary 
to the mere bare cold existence that might have been the lot of 
man, but bestowed upon him in such variety and profusion as 
almost baffles the comprehension, and shows the boundless love of 
the Creator in placing such happiness within the reach of his 
creatures. 

This feeling is evinced in the following passage taken from a 
sermon on " The Immortality of the Soul ; " and will be seen to 
pervade not only his sermons, but his lectures, and even his reviews, 
wherever the subject admits of any allusion to religion. 

He says, speaking of the faculties of animals : — " If man, like 
these, had only talents to gather his support, and defeat the hostile 
animals which surround him, no hope of immortality could be 
gathered from a condition like this ; man would be of the earth, 
earthy ; destined to live in the world with qualities fitted for this 
world, and to all appearance limited to it. But in speaking of the 
mind of man, we forget and we pass over all those faculties which 
are sufficient for the preservation of life. We do not wonder at 
man because he is cunning in procuring food, but we are amazed 
with the variety, the superfluity, the immensity of human talents. 
We are astonished that he should have found his way over the seas, 
and numbered the stars, and called by its name every earth, and 
stone, and plant, and creeping reptile that the Almighty has made. 
We see him gathered together in great cities, guided by laws, dis- 
ciplined by instruction, softened by fine arts, and saactified by 

D 



50 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

solemn worship. We count over the pious spirits of the world, the 
beautiful writers, the great statesmen, all who have invented 
subtlely, who have thought deeply, who have executed wisely : all 
these are proofs that we are destined for a second life ; and it is 
not possible to believe that this redundant vigour, this lavish and 
excessive power, was given for the mere gathering of meat and 
drink. If the only object is present existence, such faculties are 
cruel, are misplaced, are useless. They all show us that there is 
something great awaiting us ; that the soul is now young and 
infantine, springing up into a more perfect life when the body falls 
into dust." 

On various occasions he dwells on the evidences of the authen- 
ticity of the Christian religion. He says : — " I have selected this 
train of reasoning with some care from the best writers in defence 
of Christianity, because it is always right that a man should be 
able to render a reason for the faith that is within him." 

In discoursing on these evidences, he enforces them with all the 
powers with which he was endowed. Having shown the authen- 
ticity of the religion he teaches, he proceeds to inculcate in a variety 
of forms the most important duties that religion enjoined : amongst 
these he has dwelt on none more frequently than " the purity and 
government of the heart? which, he says, " is God's, and to God it 
will return ; n " it is the ark of God." " Is the passport to heaven 
written anywhere else than in a pure heart ?" He shows how in 
this respect the Christian differs from all spurious religions, not 
contenting itself with ceremonies and outward forms, but requiring 
thought, word, and deed. 

" The beauty of the Christian religion is, that it carries the order 
and discipline of heaven into our very fancies and conceptions, 
and, by hallowing the first shadowy notions of our minds from 
which actions spring, makes our actions themselves good and 
holy." 

Toleration, long-suffering, and charity, he gathers from every 
page of the Gospel. " The Church," he says, "must be distinguished 
from religion itself ; we might be Christians without any Established 
Church at all, as some countries of the world are at this day. A 
church establishment is only an instrument for teaching religion, 
but an instrument of admirable contrivance and of vast utility. The 
Church of England is the wisest and most enlightened sect of 
Christians ; I think so, or I would not belong to it another hour. 
But is it possible for me to believe that every Christian out of the 
pale of that Church will be consigned after this life to the never- 
ending wrath of God ? If I were to preach such doctrines, who 
would hear me ? Can I paint God as the protector of one Christian 
creed, dead to all prayers, blind to all woes but ours ?— God, whom 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 51 

the Indian Christian, whom the Armenian Christian, whom the 
Greek Christian, whom the Catholic, whom the Protestant, adore 
in a varied manner, in another climate, with a fresh priest and a 
changed creed. Are you and I to live again, and are these Chris- 
tians as well as us not to live again ? Foolish, arrogant man has 
said this, but God has never said this. He calls for the just in 
Christ. He tells us that through that name He will reward every 
good man, and accept every just action ; that if you take up the 
cross of Christ He will reward you for every kind deed, repay you 
sevenfold for every example of charity, carefully note and everlast- 
ingly recompense the justice, the honour, the integrity, the bene- 
volence of your present life. And yet, though God is the God of 
all Christians, each says to the other, He is not your God, but my 
God ; not the God of the just in Christ, but the God of Calvin, the 
God of Luther, or the God of the Papal Crown." 

" The true Christian, amid all the diversities of opinion, searches 
for the holy in desire, for the good in council, for the just in works ; 
and he loves the good, under whatever temple, at whatever altar he 
may find them." 

" If I have read well my Gospel, it is in such wise we should imi- 
tate the patient forbearance of our common Father, who pities the 
frailties we do not pity, who forgives the error we do not forgive, 
who maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and 
sendeth rain on the just and the unjust." 

He insists strongly on the vital importance of the religious edu- 
cation of youth : — " When you see a child brought up in the way 
he should go, you see a good of which you cannot measure the 
quantity, nor perceive the end ; it may be communicated to the 
children's children of that child. It may last for centuries ; it may 
be communicated to innumerable individuals. It may be planting 
a plant, and sowing a seed, which may fill the 'land with the 
glorious increase of righteousness, and bring upon us the blessings 
of the Almighty." 

He then points out the true pleasures, the use and the abuse, of 
youth ; the preparations for age ; the warnings sent by a merciful 
God ; the utility of meditation on death ; the worthlessness of this 
world but as a stepping-stone to a better. And thus, whilst raising 
the mind from earth to heaven, and urging, as he says, " nothing 
foolish, nothing romantic, nothing bordering on ridicule or enthu- 
siasm," he inculcates a recollection that there are really and truly 
things above this world, and coming after this world, and better 
than this world. He exhorts us to live as others live, and do as 
others do, but at the same time to live to higher purposes than 
others live, and do greater and better actions than others do. He 
then enters into the detail of those virtues, and the attack on those 



52 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

vices, which the wisdom of God has either commanded or forbidden 
for the happiness of man. 

This, I believe, will be found to be an accurate analysis of the 
use he made of his ministry. Few extracts have been made, from 
the difficulty of selection ; but I may venture to say that those 
who will seek, and select for themselves, will not be unrewarded. 

As however my opinion can hardly be considered an impartial 
one, I may be allowed to quote two or three extracts from publi- 
cations, after his death, in confirmation of it. " In a literary point 
of view," says one writer, " these sermons stand alone among 
modern pulpit discourses ; they have not the theological learning 
which distinguishes some, or the mystical eloquence that gives 
character to the out-pourings of the present Bishop of Oxford ; but 
how full of freshness and life they are ! There is nothing of com- 
pilation or imitation in them ; the writer has not consulted other 
divines for topics and ideas, but, selecting his text, he has treated 
it from the stores of his mind, exhibiting his own view on questions 
of doctrine, and illustrating matters of practice from his own obser- 
vation and experience of mankind, and it bears the strong impress 
which vigorous life always imparts." 

Another says : — " Christianity was not a dogma with Sydney 
Smith, it was a practical and most beneficent creed ; it was the 
rule of action to his life. The volume contains not a thought or 
opinion at war with Christian charity." 

And again, one says :— "But how beautiful were the serious moods 
of Sydney Smith ! What a fine fulness and solidity they had ; 
drawn from the strength and justice which we believe to have been 
the ruling sense of his mind, and tempered with the warmth of 
character, of which no man had a larger share. What a picture is 
that in one of his sermons, where he describes the village school, and 
the tattered scholars, and the aged, poverty-stricken master, teach- 
ing the mechanical art of reading or writing, and thinking he was 
teaching that alone, while in truth he was protecting life, insuring 
property, fencing the altar, guarding the throne, giving space and 
liberty to all the fine powers of man, and lifting him up to his own 
place in the order of creation ! " 

I shall content myself with but one more extract, from his 
Charity Sermon in behalf of the Blind, as it was the one which 
elicted the splendid eulogium from Mr Dugald Stewart, to which I 
have alluded elsewhere. 

" The author of the book of Ecclesiastes has told us t that the 
light is sweet, that it is a pleasant thing for the eyes to behold the 
sun/ The sense of sight is indeed the highest bodily privilege, 
the purest physical pleasure, which man has derived from his 
Creator. To see that wandering fire, after he has finished his 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 53 

journey through the nations, coming back to his eastern heavens, 
the mountains painted with light, the floating splendour of the sea, 
the earth waking from deep slumber, the day flowing down the 
sides of the hills till it reaches the secret valleys, the little insect 
recalled to life, the bird trying her wings, man going forth to his 
labour, — each created being moving, thinking, acting, contriving, 
according to the scheme and compass of its nature, by force, by 
cunning, by reason, by necessity. Is it possible to joy in this 
animated scene, and feel no pity for the sons of darkness ? for the 
eyes that will never see light ? for the poor clouded in everlasting 
gloom ? If you ask me why they are miserable and dejected, I 
turn you to the plentiful valleys ; to the fields now bringing forth 
their increase ; to the freshness and the flowers of the earth ; to 
the endless variety of its colours ; to the grace, the symmetry, the 
shape of all it cherishes and all it bears ; these you have for- 
gotten, because you have always enjoyed them : but these are the 
means by which God Almighty makes man what he is — cheerful, 
lively, erect, full of enterprise, mutable, glancing from heaven to 
earth, prone to labour and to act. Why was not the earth left 
without form and void ? Why was not darkness suffered to re- 
main on the face of the deep ? Why did God place lights in the 
firmament, for days, for seasons, for signs, and for years ? That 
He might make man the happiest of created beings ; that He 
might give to this his favourite creation a wider scope, a more 
permanent duration, a richer diversity of joy. This is the reason 
why the blind are miserable and dejected — because their soul is 
mutilated, and dismembered of its best sense — because they are a 
laughter and a ruin, and the boys of the streets mock at their 
stumbling feet. 

" Therefore, I implore you, by the Son of David, have mercy on 
the blind. If there is not pity for all sorrows, turn the full and 
perfect man to meet the inclemency of fate ; let not those who have 
never tasted the pleasures of existence be assailed by any of its 
sorrows ; the eyes which are never gladdened by light should 
never stream with tears. 

" How merciful our blessed Saviour was wont to show himself 
to their afflictions ! Blind Bartimeus sat by the wayside begging ; 
and as the crowd passed by, he cried with a loud voice, ' Thou 
Son of David, have mercy upon me ! ' Jesus stopped the multi- 
tude, and before them all restored to him his sight. The first 
thing that he saw, who never saw before, was the Son of his God ! 
These blind people, like Bartimeus, will never see, till they behold 
their Redeemer on the last day : not as He then was, in his 
earthly shape, but girded by all the host of heaven,— the Judge of 
nations, the everlasting Counsellor, the Prince of peace. At that 



54 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

hour this heaven and earth will pass away, and all things melt 
with fervent heat : but in the wreck of worlds no tittle of mercy 
shall perish, and the deeds of the just shall be recorded in the 
mind of God." 

In giving this little sketch of his writings, I have somewhat an- 
ticipated in my narrative, and must return to my father's residence 
in Edinburgh. Mr Beach had requested him to receive his second 
son under his charge, and at the same time Mr Gordon, of Ellon 
Castle, was entrusted to his care by his guardians. 

For the care of each of these young men he received .£400, the 
highest sum which had been then given to any one but Mr Dugald 
Stewart. He fully justified the trust reposed in him ; he lived with 
them as a father and a friend. They are both still alive, and both, 
I believe, retain warm feelings of love and respect for the memory 
of their former Mentor ; indeed one of them always evinced a truly 
filial affection towards him. 

On one occasion he was much amused by the complaints made 
by his young friends of the difficulty of finding conversation for 
their partners in the two balls a week which he allowed them 
during the season. " Oh," said he, " I '11 fit you up in five minutes : 
I'll write you some conversations, and you will be considered the 
two most agreeable young men in Edinburgh," Pen and ink were 
brought, the conversations — numbers one, two, and three — written 
down amidst fits of laughter. Each youth chose his conversa- 
tion ; and it would be difficult to say who was the most amused, 
the writer, the speaker, or the hearer, by this novel expedient. 

During his residence in Edinburgh, though without any clerical 
duties of his own, my father not unfrequently preached in the 
Episcopal church, then served by Bishop Sandford ; and I believe 
the earliest of the charity sermons he has preached (of which there 
are several very touching ones amongst those which have been 
published) was for the Lying-in Hospital. The singular custom 
which was then always observed, of delivering these sermons at 
night, seems to have given occasion to a striking passage in it. 

A few months after the birth of his daughter, he went in the sum- 
mer for a short time to Burntisland, a small sea-bathing place at no 
great distance from Edinburgh, for the recovery of my mother's 
healths From hence he writes : — 

"Sunday, July, 1802. 
"My dear Madam, 

" I cannot remain a single day without thanking you for your 
kind letter. The interpretation you put on Mrs Smith's illness 
originated, I am sure, in your goodness of heart, and in that spirit 
of kindness with which I have always been treated by you ; but I 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 55 

can assure you most sincerely, it is not just. Mrs Sydney is as 
cheerful and as happy as it is possible for a woman to be who is 
suffering from great bodily weakness ; and even this cause of her 
suffering, thank God, is considerably diminished since I wrote to 
you last, as she has already derived much advantage from her short 
residence here. 

" Nothing can be more delightful than the situation in which we 
are placed ; and you would laugh to see the various contrivances 
to which we have had recourse to make our cabin comfortable. 
Our meat-larder is a hamper, and hung to a beam ; Mrs Smith's 
dressing-table a herring-barrel ; her bell a pair of tongs tied to a 
rope, passed through the door. The books are kept in the corner 
cupboard with the yellow pickles ; and all sorts of articles for the 
brains and the stomach, hard and soft, sweet and sour, corruptible 
and incorruptible, are huddled together. There is a very snug cor- 
ner left for William, and he will be extremely pleased with this place. 

" Little Saba is really a charming child, and I have discovered 
in her all the virtues you suppose me to have done. 

" God bless you, dear Madam ! and believe me yours ever, 

" Sydney Smith/' 

Here, but for his courage and firmness, he would have lost his 
long-wished-for daughter, in a way he had not at all anticipated. 
When only six months old she fell ill of the croup, with such fear- 
ful violence, that it defied all the remedies employed by the best 
medical man there. The danger increased with every hour. Dr 
Hamilton, then one of the most eminent medical men in Edinburgh, 
was sent for, could not come, but said, " Persevere in giving two 
grains of calomel every hour ; I never knew it fail." It was given 
for eleven hours ; the child grew worse and worse ; the medical man 
in attendance then said, " I dare give no more ; I can do no more, 
the child must die, but at this age I would not venture to give more 
to my own child." " You," said my father, " can do no more ; 
Hamilton says, Persevere ; I will take the responsibility, I will 
give it to her myself." He gave it, and the child was saved. 

In his account of this attack, to his friend Mrs Beach, my father 
says : — 

" Mrs Smith is much better, and my little girl perfectly recovered 
from a severe attack of the croup. By the bye, it may be worth 
while to inform you that she was saved from this fatal and rapid 
disease by taking two grains of calomel every hour till the symp- 
toms subsided, and then gradually lessening the doses ; so that 
she took in twenty-four hours thirty-two grains, besides bleeding 
and blistering and emetics ; and is not yet six months old." 



56 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Another instance of his moral courage and presence of mind 
occurred in after-life. He was accidentally at the house of a near 
relation soon after her confinement, who was suddenly seized by a 
most alarming attack. Her husband was from home ; the very 
eminent medical man who attended her was absent, and all the 
others sent to in this moment of distress were out also. At last, a 
young medical man was brought, who declared the danger to be 
imminent ; that if the patient were a pauper, he would bleed her 
instantly, which would probably save her life : he feared, however, 
to interfere in a case attended by so eminent a man ; as, if he 
failed, he should be ruined. My father's medical knowledge con- 
firming this opinion, he determined to take the whole responsibility 
upon himself, and insisted on the patient being bled before he left 
the house. Relief was immediate, and by the time the husband 
returned, the sufferer was safe. 

At the end of the autumn he returned again to Edinburgh for 
the winter, and his time there was divided between his pupils ; the 
Edinburgh Review, to which he was at that period not only con- 
tributor, but editor ; the enjoyment of the choicest society that was 
to be found anywhere out of London ; and the study of medicine, 
anatomy, and moral philosophy. He was a constant attendant on 
the admirable lectures of Mr Dugald Stewart, in the University of 
Edinburgh, with whom he lived in habits of almost daily communi- 
cation ; as also with that remarkable man, Dr Thomas Brown, 
who succeeded Mr Stewart in the Professor's chair of Moral 
Philosophy, and from whom he imbibed a keen love of the subjects 
connected with that science. 

Medicine and anatomy had always been favourite pursuits of 
my father's, even when at Oxford. He bestowed so much atten- 
tion indeed on the study of the former under Sir Christopher Pegge, 
that the Professor much wished hirn to become a physician. Feel- 
ing now that such knowledge might be of great use in his future 
destination, the Church, he pursued it with ardour, and attended 
the Clinical Lectures at the hospitals in Edinburgh, given by Dr 
Gregory. He thus obtained a degree of knowledge that enabled 
him afterwards to be of great service to the poor of his parish, who 
entirely depended on him for assistance ; and to become the 
favourite doctor of his own family, who rarely summoned any other 
medical man to their aid. I have the authority of my husband. 
Sir Henry Holland (who had very frequent opportunities of observ- 
ing his practice, and ascertaining his knowledge of medicine), for 
saying, that both his judgment and knowledge were very remark- 
able ; and used with the same prudence and good sense which ha 
exercised on all other subjects. 



CHAPTER IV. 

Quits Edinburgh for London— Settles in Doughty Street— Legal and other Friends— 

Obtains Preachership of Foundling Hospital — Refusal of Dr to enable him to 

lease a Chapel— Sermon to Volunteers — Friendship with Lord Holland — Holland 
House — Preachership of St John's Chapel — Lectures at Royal Institution — Poverty 
— Weekly Suppers — Anecdote of Sir J. Mackintosh and his Cousin — Elected to the 
Johnson Literary Club — The King reads his Review, and says he will never be a 
Bishop— Preaches on Toleration at the Temple Church— Increase of Reputation and 
Friends — Anecdotes. 

My father, in 1803, having finished the education of his other 
pupil, Mr Gordon, was requested by Mr Beach to remain a year 
longer in Edinburgh with his son William ; but, thinking this plan 
injurious both to his young friend and himself, he felt it his duty to 
decline it, and to resolve upon some course of life which might 
secure to himself a permanent independence ; and therefore ad- 
dressed the following letter to Mrs Beach on the subject : — 

"Edinburgh, Jamiary, 1803. 
" My dear Madam, 

" Your son has communicated to me the very flattering request 
of Mr Beach and yourself, that I should continue here another 
year ; and it is a matter of real regret to me that I should be com- 
pelled to decline any proposal which it would give you pleasure 
that I should accept. I have one child, and I expect another : it 
is absolutely my duty that I should make some exertion for their 
future support. The salary you give is liberal ; I live here in ease 
and abundance ; but a situation in this country leads to nothing. 
I have to begin the world, at the end of three years, at the very 
same point where I set out from ; it would be the same at the end 
of ten. I should return to London, my friends and connexions 
mouldered away, my relations gone and dispersed ; and myself 
about to begin to do at the age of forty what I ought to have begun 
to do at the age of twenty-five. 

" That my connexion with William did not end two years ago I 
most heartily rejoice ; for after the kindness you and Mr B. showed 
to me during my residence in Netherhaven, I should ever have 
reproached myself as the most ungrateful of human beings. That 
kindness I shall never forget ; and I shall quit this country with a 
very large balance of obligation on my side, which I shall always 



5 8 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

be proud to acknowledge. But I could not hold myself justified to 
my wife and family if I were to sacrifice, any longer, to the love of 
present ease, those exertions which every man is bound to make 
for the improvement of his situation. 

"After all, my dear madam, are you doing right in keeping 
William any longer from the University ? Are you not listening 
rather to your affection than your reason ? One of the great objects 
of education is to accustom a young man gradually to become his 
own master. If a young man of William's great good sense cannot 
meet the little world of a University at twenty years of age, he 
cannot meet the great world at any age. It is in vain to tremble 
at the risk ; all life is a constant risk of doing wrong. To accustom 
men to great risks, you must expose them, when boys, to lesser 
risks. If you attempt to avoid all risks, you do an injury infinitely 
greater than any you shun. 

" You will, I am sure, be obliged to me for speaking my opinion 
thus freely ; and if I understand you both aright, I am equally sure 
that I shall not have offended you by fairly laying open to you 
those motives which have induced me to decline an offer that I 
received with the greatest pleasure, as a proof of your continued 
good opinion. Sydney Smith." 

On being asked to recommend some books to Miss B to 

purchase : — 

" Sir Joshua Reynolds's Lectures. Mitford's History of Greece. 
Orme's History of Hindostan. Vertot's Revolutions of Portugal 
and Sweden. Bossuet's Oraisons Funebres. Petit Careme de 
Massillon. Select Sermons of Dr Barrow. Burke's Settlement of 
the English Colonies in America. Alison on Taste. 

" The first book, though written on painting, full of all wisdom. 
The second, a good history. The third, highly entertaining, with 
ditto. The fifth, a splendid example of sound eloquence. The 
sixth, piety, pure language, fine style. The seventh, lofty eloquence. 
The eighth, neat and philosophical. The ninth, feeling and 
eloquence. Here, I think, is as much wisdom as you can get for 
eight guineas. But remember to consult your family physician, 
your mother. I only know the general powers of these medicines ; 
but she will determine their adaptation to your particular constitu- 
tion, 

" Yours, dear Miss B , very sincerely, 

" Sydney Smith." 

My father was most reluctant to quit Edinburgh, where he had 
many valuable friends and was much sought after ; and where his 
name would have probably continued to procure him pupils. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



59 



My mother, however was more ambitious for him than he was 
for himself; and feeling that he was meant for better and higher 
things, and that his talents were worthy of a more extensive sphere, 
she used all her influence to induce him to seek it where alone it 
was to be found. After much deliberation, and feeling that, having 
embraced the Church as a profession, he ought to adhere to it, he 
determined to yield to her wishes, plunge at once into London, and 
endeavour to make known, where they were most likely to be 
appreciated, such talents as he possessed. He therefore broke up 
his camp in Edinburgh, much to his own and his friends' regret, 
and established himself in London in the year 1803. 

On his first arrival there, he took a small house in Doughty 
Street, Russell Square, attracted thither by the legal society which 
then resided in that part of London, and of which he was always 
very fond. 

This removal to London turned out to be the wisest step my 
father could have taken. Yet, friendless as he then was, and 
obnoxious to Government as he had become by his principles and 
writings, and without any obvious means of increasing his income, 
it was not carried through without considerable anxiety and a 
severe and courageous struggle with poverty ; and, to add to his 
difficulties and anxieties, soon after his arrival in town his family 
was increased by the birth of a son. 

My grandmother, Mrs Pybus, whose death, as has been 
mentioned, took place shortly before my father quitted Edinburgh, 
had left my mother her own and her eldest daughter's (Lady 
Fletcher's) jewels, which were of some value. My mother, feeling 
that such ornaments were unbecoming in her present position, 
insisted upon their being sold as soon as they came to London ; 
and she describes my father's " comical anxiety lest mankind 
should recover from their illusion, and cease to value such 
glittering baubles before they could be sold." The negotiation 
begun with the jeweller, Sydney was not easy till it was accom- 
plished ; and even then, she says, she does not think he was quite 
easy in his mind at having helped to continue the illusion by 
accepting so large a price for them. 

Soon after settling in his little house in Doughty Street, my 
father appears to have received a very liberal offer from Mr Beach, 
to which the following letter was the answer , and it is pleasant to 
be able to record such sentiments mutually existing after so close 
and trying a connection between them, of six years' duration. 

"Doughty Street, August, 1803. 
" My dear Sir, 
" You w»ll excuse me for being particular about trifles, but the 



60 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

interest of the small sum left in your hands MUST be four, and not 
five per cent. You say, ' Be assured I never thought of keeping 
your money in my hands without paying you five per cent for it.' 
I should, my dear Sir, have been acquainted with you for six years 
to very little purpose if I could have supposed you had entertained 
any such thought. I am very sure you had rather give me ten per 
cent then one per cent for my money. I will do you the justice to 
say, that in all transactions which respect property, I have 
uniformly found and seen you desirous that the advantage should 
be against you rather than for you ; and I have never seen you so 
desirous of relinquishing advantages as when it was in your power, 
from the situation of the other party, to obtain them. 

" I have found out an excellent successor to Caesar,* — a young 
puppy, that will, I think, be larger than that sagacious favourite. 
Discuss with Mrs Beach whether you will accept of him, and let us 
know when we come. 

"Sydney Smith." 

Of the early part of his career in London I of course know 
nothing, and recollect hearing but little. He early formed the 
acquaintance, and obtained the friendship, of several eminent 
lawyers then living in that neighbourhood. The most distinguished 
of these were Sir S. Romilly, Mr Scarlett (afterwards Lord 
Abinger), and Sir J. Mackintosh. To these may be added Ur 
Marcet, M. Dumont, Mr Whishaw, Lord Dudley (then Mr Ward), 
Mr Sharpe, Mr Rogers, Mr Luttrell, and Mr Tenant. The latter, 
under the most uncouth appearance, combined such simplicity, 
warmth of heart, and varied knowledge, as made him a general 
favourite in this little circle. The mysteries of his mhiage often 
afforded great amusement to his friends. He lived in a small 
lodging, and his establishment consisted solely of an old black 
servant, who tyrannized over him in no small degree, called 
Dominique. He was overheard one morning calling from his bed, 
"Dominique! Dominique !'' but no Dominique appeared. "Why 
don't you bring me my stockings, Dominique?" "Can't come, 
massa." " Why can't you come, Dominique ?" " Can't come 
massa, I 'm dronke." Mr Tenant, who probably thought it a law 
of nature that Dominique should be drunk, for he was seldom 
otherwise, submitted with the greatest meekness. 

My father also became acquainted with some of the French 
emigrants, of whom there were many at this time resident in 
London and its neighbourhood ; amongst these, some, from their 
cultivation and the refinement of their manners, became very 
agreeable additions to his society. Of these, I remember a M. 

* A magnificent Newfoundland dog. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH 61 

Dutens,* and a charming old Abb£, who became quite one of the 
family. I can recall his pale, mild face, his thin figure, smart 
shoe-buckles, little cane, and snuff-box, though I forget his name. 
He was bent on inventing a miiversal language ; and used in his 
simplicity constantly to come and consult my father, who, much 
amused by his project, suggested a few grammatical difficulties 
from time to time. The poor old Abbe*, out of all patience, at last 
exclaimed, " Oh non, monsieur, ce sont la des bagatelles ! La 
seule difficult^ que je trouve e'est de faire agir tous les rois 
d'Europe au meme instant." My father admitted that this was a 
slight difficulty ; but we left London, or the old Abbe left England, 
before he had solved it. 

In the following letter my father speaks of the illness of an infant 
son, who died shortly after, and whose death is touchingly alluded 
to in some of the letters to Jeffrey 

" Doughty Street, October 8, 1803. 
' My dear Madam, 

" I promised I would let you know the issue of my little boy's 
illness, because, having mentioned his illness as a reason why I 
could not meet Mr Beach and William at Oxford, I was sure you 
would have the kindness to interest yourself in the event. On 
Tuesday he had two fits, and on Thursday night eight ; last night 
he escaped ; to-day is much better, and I think is almost out of 
danger. You will think my apology good enough for not meeting 
Mr Beach at Oxford, which, but for this accident, I certainly 
should. I am very sure, my dear madam, you would be glad to 
see us ; and in future times of prosperity and peace I hope we 
shall pass some happy hours together. 

" I beg leave to differ from you respecting the danger incurred 
by William, — not to flatter you into a security which you ought 
not to enjoy, but to banish the notion of a risk to which you are 
not exposed. All young men who begin to manage themselves 
may possibly manage themselves badly ; but I never saw a young 
man for whose safety I should be under less apprehensions. He is 
prudent, calm, not apt to contract sudden friendships, and of a 
very excellent understanding. From what points of his character 
you derive your fears for his conduct I cannot conceive ; nor can 
I in any degree subscribe to your opinion that a University life is 
more pregnant with danger to a character such as his than to that 
of his elder brother. 

" I shall be extremely happy to keep up my correspondence with 
William, and I wish him well most affectionately and sincerely. 
If any little suggestions of mine can be of service, I will not fail to 

* Author of " Me'moires d'un Voyageur qui se repose." 



62 MEMOIR OF I HE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

make them ; but you are well aware that all advice is a mere 
feather in the scale, and that it rests upon himself to take his place 
in society. Sydney Smith/' 

My father says, speaking of his prospects in London : — " I have 
as yet found no place to preach in ; it is more difficult than I had 
imagined. Two or three random sermons I have discharged, and 
thought I perceived that the greater part of the congregation 
thought me mad. The clerk was as pale as death in helping me 
off with my gown, for fear I should bite him. I am about to 
preach a charity sermon for schools. I shall take some pains with 
the subject, and extend it into the general question of education of 
the poor. It is a subject I have long wished to discuss from the 
pulpit ; it is very comprehensive and important, and loaded with 
prejudices and misrepresentations." 

On receiving an invitation in 1804 from Mrs Beach, my father 
writes : — 

" Doughty Street, May 1804. 
" My dear Madam, 
" Mr Beach and yourself were so obliging as to invite us to visit 
you this summer ; but we could not be happy if we were to leave 
our little girl behind. Now, other people's little girls are very 
troublesome animals, and nothing would be more painful to Mrs 
Sydney and myself than to intrude upon your hospitality. You 
will, therefore, I am sure, have the goodness to inform us candidly 
whether or not she may come. If it should be convenient to ycu 
to receive so large a party, the period most agreeable to us will 
be towards the beginning of August, if that will suit you. I am 
broiled to death by this weather. Neither the Ministry nor the 
Opposition can keep their forces together, and everybody is going 
out of town. Even in my quarter of the town the people make a 
show of going away, block up their windows, and retire into the 
back rooms. I hope this letter, my dear madam, will find you 
more cool than it leaves me ; and I remain, with best regards, 
sincerely yours, Sydney Smith." 

In the summer of 1804 the alarm occasioned by the idea of 
French invasion was rapidly increasing, and volunteers were pour- 
ing in from all ranks and classes. One of the earliest sermons my 
father seems to have been called upon to preach was on this sub- 
ject, before a large body of volunteers collected in the Metropolis. 
He closes it by saying, " I have a boundless confidence in the 
English character ; I believe that they have more real religion, 
more probity, more knowledge, and more genuine worth, than 
exists in the whole world besides. They are the guardians of pure 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 63 

Christianity ; and from this prostituted nation of merchants (as 
they are in derision called) I believe more heroes will spring up in 
the hour of danger than all the military nations of ancient and 
modern Europe have ever produced. Into the hands of God, then, 
and his ever-merciful Son, we cast ourselves, and wait in humble 
patience the result. First we ask for victory ; but, if that cannot 
be, we have only one other prayer — we implore for death." 

A year or two after, he preached another sermon for the suffering 
Swiss. 

About this time he made the acquaintance of Sir Thomas Barnard, 
who was so much struck with his sense and originality, that he recom- 
mended him to the preachership of the Foundling Hospital, at ^50 
per annum ; which employment, small as was the remuneration, 
was gladly accepted. Slight as this service was, and probably 
suggested more for the benefit of the Hospital than for that of my 
father, I must still feel grateful to one who thus held out a helping 
hand to a clever and friendless young man struggling with the 
difficulties of the world and eager to perform the duties of his pro- 
fession ; a kindness which was the more felt, from the contrast it 
afforded to the impediments most unexpectedly thrown in his way 
about the same time by others. 

A chapel, then occupied by a sect of Dissenters calling themselves 

the New Jerusalem, and belonging to Mr D , was most kindly 

offered by him on lease to my father, if he could obtain the necessary 
license from the rector of the parish. His earnest and touching 
appeal to one he believed to be his friend, to grant this, and thus 
enable him to support his family and benefit the parish by his 
exertions in his profession, will be seen in the following letters ; and 
with what result, and for what reasons rejected. I mention no 
names, as I wish to excite no angry feelings, and both men are now 
gone to a higher tribunal ; but I cannot refrain from stating one of 
the many difficulties my father had to contend with in his profession, 

To Dr. . 

"London. 

"Dear Sir, 

"I am about to address myself to you upon a subject which 

very materially concerns my happiness and interest, and on which 

therefore I am sure you will consider, with as much disposition to 

befriend a brother clergyman as you can entertain consistently with 

your duty. Messrs. and Co. have agreed to let me a lease of 

the chapel in Street : will you, under any restrictions, and 

upon any conditions, allow me to preach there t 

"In the first place, I cannot doubt that where a place of worship 
is to exist inyour parish, you would rather that the worship of the 



64 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Church of England were carried on there, than that it should belong 
to such sectaries as the Christians of the New Jerusalem (as they 
entitle themselves). I should have greater reluctance in making 
this request if the places of .worship in your parish were thinly at- 
tended, or if they were more than sufficient for the population of 
the parish ; but, on the contrary, numbers are sent away every 
Sunday from your church, for want of room. Many families have 
in vain waited for years to obtain seats there ; and the other chapels- 
of-ease I understand to be quite filled, though they cannot be said 
to be so overflowing. This chapel does not hold above three 
hundred and fifty persons, exclusive of servants ; the mere over- 
flowings of your church would fill it. 

"It is, I admit, of great importance for you to consider whether I 
am, or am not, such a person as you would wish to perform the 
duties of a minister in your parish. This you can easily enough 
ascertain. I have officiated nearly two years in Berkeley Chapel, 
where the Primate of Ireland, the Bishop of Lichfield, and Dr 
Dutens have seats: of the two former gentlemen I know nothing; 
with Dr Dutens I am well acquainted. If these three dignified and 
respectable clergymen have any objection to make to my doctrines, 
I do not wish that the request I make to you should be successful, 
and I am the first to withdraw it. But if they say of me that my 
preaching commands attention, that I have any talent for enforcing 
moral and religious truth, and that I may be beneficially entrusted 
with such an office in any situation, — such testimony, I am sure, 
will have its due weight with you, and if you can let me preach, you 
will. It has often been said of the proprietors of chapels, that they 
are rather apt to tell such truths as are pleasant, than such as are 
useful. I appeal to the same gentlemen, whether the fear of offend- 
ing any one, let his rank and situation be what it may, has ever 
prevented me from enforcing duties on which I thought myself 
bound to animadvert ; and you will excuse me if I say that you 
yourself, who have nothing to gain by pleasing or to lose by offend- 
ing, have not attacked the vices of the rich and the great with 
more honest freedom than I have done, though your superior 
years, station, and understanding have of course enabled you to 
do it with much greater effect. 

" My pretensions however of this nature must of course be judged 
by others. But of my situation in life (as I am the only judge of 
it) I hope you will allow me to say a few words. I am a married 
fnan, with two children, and as I am young my family may increase ; 
I have a very small fortune, no preferment, nor any friends who are 
likely to give me any. The chapel where I preach at present will, 
I fancy, soon be sold ; and it is not impossible that the clergyman 
Who can afford to purchase it may choose to preach himself. It is 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 65 

not for want of exertion, my situation in the church is not better, 
for I have not been idle in the narrow and obscure field which is 
open to the inferior clergy. I hope you will have the kindness to 
consider these circumstances, before you refuse me the opportunity 
of supporting my family and bettering my situation by my own 
exertions. 

" A few years ago. my dear Sir, when your situation was what 
mine is, such considerations would have touched you, and you would 
have acknowledged their force. You know well the difficulties and 
the miseries of a curate's life ; and I am sure you are the last man 
in the world to forget them, merely because you have overcome 
them with so much honour and distinction. I am aware it will be 
necessary to apply to the patron of the living if your answer should 
be favourable to me, but I fancy it is regular to make the first ap- 
plication to you ; and I rather write than call upon you, because I 
think it unfair, on such subjects, to take gentlemen by surprise, 
where sufficient leisure ought to be given for deliberation. In a 
week's time I will call upon you for an answer ; if you grant my 
request, I shall feel very grateful to you. I shall receive your 
answer, with great anxiety, and am, 

" My dear Sir, with great respect, 

" Your obedient servant, 

" Sydney Smith." 

From the Rev. Sydney Smith to Dr . 

" Dear Sir, 

" If I do not hear from you to the contrary, I will call upon you 
after morning service on Sunday. I forgot to mention in my letter 
to you, that Mr Barnard* gave me leave to make any use I please 
of his name in the way of reference. I beg you to recollect that the 
question before you for your decision, is a choice between fanati- 
cism and the worship of the Church of England in your parish ; one 
or the other must exist. If I doubted of any of the doctrines of the 
Church of England, if I were possessed of any foolish and absurd 
tenets of my own, I should be immediately qualified by law to open 
the chapel ; I hope you will not disqualify me merely because I am 
a firm and zealous advocate in the same cause with yourself, for this 
would be to give a bounty on dissent and heresy. It would be a 
very different question if I asked you to let me open a new place of 
worship ; but I merely ask you to change that worship from the 
present method, which you completely disapprove, to that which you 
completely approve and eminently practise. 

" Excuse the trouble I give you ; but when a poor clergyman 
sees an honest and respectable method of improving his situation 

" Afterwards Sir Thomas Barnard. 



66 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

in life, you cannot wonder at his anxiety- You will make me a very 
happy man, if you consent to my request 

" With great respect, &c. &c, 

11 Sydney Smith." 

Dr 's first answer is not given, as my father's next letter 

states its contents. 

From the Rev. Sydney Smith to Dr . 

" Dear Sir, 

" The principal objection which your letter contained against the 
permission I requested, is the reluctance you state yourself to feel 
to imposing an obligation on your successors. Would you then ob- 
ject to give me leave to preach during your life, leaving it entirely 
open, by such limited concession, to those who succeed you, to con- 
tinue or suspend the permission ? Let me place myself entirely out 
of the question, and put the argument to you : — if any new person 
whom you may allow to preach in your parish, is a man very little 
calculated for such an office, it is not probable that people will quit 
the Established places of worship to resort to him ; if he is, it is 
probable he will draw many to church who would not otherwise go, 
and that the mass of people who attend public worship in that 
parish will be materially increased ; which, I presume, is a conse- 
quence that every parish minister sincerely wishes for and would 
make some effort to obtain. I beg you to reflect, as I said in my 
last note (which crossed your letter), that I am not asking you to let 
me open a place of worship in your parish, — it is already open, — 
but I ask you to let me change the absurd and disgraceful devotion 
which is going on there at present (and will go on there still), for 
the devotion of the Church of England. I ask you to give me the 
preference over a low and contemptible fanatic ; and will you allow 
me, without the slightest intention of offending you, to lay before 
you the seeming inconsistency of your answer ? 

" You say, ' I allow you have considerable talents for preaching, 
I know you have been well educated, I am sure you will be of great 
use, but I give a decided preference over you to a very foolish and a 
very ignorant Methodist, whose extravagance is debauching the 
minds of the lower class of my parishioners, and whom I should be 
heartily glad to see driven out of my parish/ Excuse my freedom, 
but such are inevitably to be the consequences deduced from your 
answer. 

" I appeal to you again, whether anything can be so enormous 
and unjust, as that that privilege should be denied to the ministers 
of the Church of England which every man who has folly and pre- 
sumption enough to differ from it can immediately enjoy ? I hope 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 67 

you will give these observations some consideration, and, as soon 
as you have, return me your answer upon them. 

"You observe that what I ask is unnecessary, and that it is an 
innovation ; but I sincerely hope you would not refuse me so great 
an advantage, unless it was pernicious as well as unnecessary; 
and that if the plan I suggest is an improvement, you will not re- 
ject it merely because it is an innovation. 

" I thank you very kindly for all the good you say of me : I will 
endeavour to deserve it. 

" I am, my dear Sir, truly yours, 

" Sydney Smith." 

From Dr to the Rev. Sydney Smith. 

" Dear Sir, 
" I was in hopes I had so expressed myself in my letter of Wed- 
nesday, that you would have immediately seen my unwillingness 
to admit the arrangement you propose respecting this chapel ; 
although at the same time I am sorry to be an obstacle in the way 
of your interest, I can only add, that the expediency of the measure 
having been considered by my predecessors, I mean to abide by 
their decision. I hope never to be offended, Sir, at the freedom of 
any who are so kind as to teach me to know myself ; and the in- 
consistency of my letter to you, which you are so good as to point 
out, is, alas ! an addition to the many inconsistencies of which I 
fear I have been too often guilty through life. 

" You will, I dare say, be glad to hear that there exists a hope 
that, ere long, the dissenters from the Establishment will not enjoy 
greater privileges than the ministers of the Establishment them- 
selves. 

" I have the honour to be, dear Sir, 
" Your obliged servant, 



Thus, in spite of his most earnest endeavours to obtain employ- 
ment, he remained poor for many years ; indeed it has often been 
an enigma to me how, in these early days, my father contrived to 
meet the necessary expenses of settling in London ; but I have lately 
discovered, from an old memorandum, that during this early period 
his eldest brother Robert kindly contributed £100 per annum for 
a few years ; and that in 1 809, when all the expenses of his removal 
into Yorkshire took place, he lent my father about ^500 ; an assist- 
ance which must have been of the greatest importance to him at 
this particular time. 

I believe he had not been long in London before he became 
known, and his society sought after, in various quarters. One of 



6S MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

the earliest U -iendships he formed on coming there was that of Lord 
Holland, whose acquaintance he had previously made when on a 
visit to his eldest brother Robert, at college ; and the subsequent 
marriage of this brother with Miss Vernon, Lord Holland's aunt, 
perhaps the more inclined Lord Holland to cultivate the society of 
one with whose merits he was then but slightly acquainted. 

I have often heard my father speak of his first introduction to 
Holland House, — the most formidable ordeal, considering the 
talents of his host and hostess, and the society always to be found 
there, that a young and obscure man could well go through. He 
was shy too then ; but I believe, in spite of the shyness, they soon 
discovered and acknowledged his merits, and deemed him no un- 
meet company for their world — and what a world it was ! 

I can hardly write of my father, and not pause a moment to speak 
of that society of which he afterwards so frequently formed a part, 
and to which he was bound through life by every tie of social enjoy- 
ment, gratitude, and friendship. The world has rarely seen, acd 
will rarely, if ever, see again, all that was to be found within the 
walls of Holland House. Genius and merit, in whatever rank of 
life, became a passport there, and all that was choicest and rarest 
in Europe seemed attracted to that spot as to their natural soil. 

Then the house itself, — a beautiful specimen of the olden times ; 
with its ancient banqueting -hall, recalling traditions of past grand- 
eur ; and its noble library, full of the wisdom of ages, and hung 
round with the portraits of those who so often animated it with 
their presence, — ought not to be forgotten. 

How melancholy, to feel that so many of those who, together with 
their much-beloved host, acted so great a part in our own times, 
and have left names that will live long after them, are now gone ! 

My father found in Lord Holland one able and willing to appre- 
ciate him, and whose society it was impossible to enjoy without 
loving as well as admiring him ; and they formed together one of 
those true friendships, so rare in human life, " which, like the 
shadows of evening, increase even till the setting of the sun." I do 
not of course presume to speak of Lord Holland but in reference 
to the charm of his intercourse with my father, which I had such 
frequent opportunities of witnessing ; and it always seemed to me 
on such occasions that there never were two men who, from the 
constitution of their minds, were more calculated to enjoy and under- 
stand each other's character than Lord Holland and Sydney Smith. 
The same intense love of public liberty and public happiness, the 
same exquisite enjoyment of wit and humour, the same clearness 
and conciseness of understanding, with great constitutional gaiety 
of spirits, made their conversation more charming to listen to than 
it is well possible to conceive without having done so, and evi- 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 69 

dently productive of the purest enjoyment to themselves. It was 
short, varied, interspersed with wit, illustration, and anecdote on 
both sides ; in short, it was the perfection of social incercourse, a 
sort of mental dra?n-dri?iking, rare as it was delightful and intoxi- 
cating. 

From the opportunities thus afforded my father of meeting at 
Holland House all the best Whig society, his acquaintance in 
London increased rapidly; and as he became generally known 
there, his company was eagerly sought for. 

Meantime his reputation was spreading in other and better ways 
than by the powers of his conversation alone. His negotiation to 
obtain a license from the clergyman of the parish, to preach in the 
chapel then occupied by the sect of the New Jerusalem, failed, as 
we have seen ; but in addition to the evening preachership of the 
Foundling Hospital, he had for two years, at the request of Mr 
Bowerbank, the proprietor of Berkeley Chapel, in John Street, 
Berkeley-square, officiated as the morning preacher there. The 
chapel had been so deserted (though the position was very advan- 
tageous), that Mr Bowerbank had been for some time endeavour- 
ing to dispose of it. In a few weeks after my father accepted it, 
not a seat was to be had : gentlemen and ladies frequently stood 
in the aisles throughout the whole service. All idea was then given 
up of disposing of it by the proprietor ; and till my father left 
London, in 1809, he continued morning preacher there, alternately 
with Fitzroy Chapel. The concise,bold raciness of his style was singu- 
larly calculated to stir up a lazy London congregation, accustomed 
to slumber over their weekly sermon ; and the earnestness of his 
manner, I have reason to believe, caused many to think who never 
thought before.* Of the effect his preaching produced at different 
periods of his life I have the most flattering evidence. When such 
a man as Mr Dugald Stewart exclaimed, after hearing him preach, 
" Those original and unexpected ideas gave me a thrilling sensa- 
tion of sublimity never before awakened by any other oratory ; " 
when his virtuous friend Horner expresses his admiration of his 
eloquence, and of the effect it produced on his congregation ; when 
the Bishop of Norwich writes, on hearing him in the country, " He 
plainly showed he felt what he said, and meant that others should 
feel too ; " when another very distinguished writer, on reading his 
sermons, says, " I opened on the Sermon on Toleration, and could 
not lay it down ; the wisdom, truth, and beauty of it, and the true 
Christian spirit shining through every sentence, and illuminating 
the whole piece as with a celestial light, perfectly enchanted me : 

* My father had the satisfaction more than once of receiving letters of gratitude, as- 
suring him that his preaching had not been in vain, and had stopped the -writer In a 
course of guilt and dissipation. 



7o MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

as he was one of the wisest of men, so I am sure he was one of the 
best; "when one as true as he is distinguished in his profession 
reminded ine the other day how he had both seen and heard my 
father's emotion in the pulpit ; — when such testimony is given by 
such men, united to that of many others which will appear in the 
course of the narrative, we are surely justified in affirming that, 
although originally entering the Church reluctantly, yet having 
done so, he devoted all the powers of his heart and mind to the 
profession to which he had before devoted his life. 

In addition to his fame as a clergyman, he obtained considerable 
increase of reputation by a course of lectures on Moral Philosophy, 
which Sir Thomas Barnard, who interested himself much about the 
Royal Institution, proposed to him to give ; and which, though my 
father speaks of them as without merit in one of his letters to his 
friend Dr Whewell, afford, as I am told, the strongest evidence of the 
clearness of his intellect and the justness of his opinions. They 
gained so much at the time from the charm of his voice and manner 
of delivery, that the sensation they created in London is perhaps 
unexampled. 

"You would be amused," says his friend Mr Horner, in his 
Letters, " to hear the account he gives of his own qualifications for 
the task, and his mode of manufacturing philosophy \ he will do 
the thing very cleverly, I have little doubt." * 

" I was," says Mrs Marcet, " a perfect enthusiast during the de- 
livery of those lectures. They remain, but he who gave a very soul 
to them by his inimitable manner is gone ! He who at one moment 
inspired his hearers with such awe and reverence by the solemn 
piety of his manner, that his discourse seemed converted into a 
sermon, at others, by the brilliancy of his wit, made us die of laugh- 
ing. The impression made on me by these lectures, though so long 
ago, is still sufficiently strong to recall his manner in many of the 
most striking passages." 

" I was present at the lectures forty years ago," says the late Sir 
Robert Peel, " and was a very young man at the time ; but I have 
not forgotten the effect which was given to the speech of Logan, 
the Indian Chief, by the tone and spirit in which it was recited." 
..." I do not find," he adds, " some verses I recollect to have been 
quoted by Mr Sydney Smith, to which equal effect was given." 

* An eye-witness says : — "All Albemarle street and a part of Grafton Street were ren- 
dered impassable by the concourse of carriages assembled there during the time of 
their delivery. There was not sufficient room for the persons assembling : the lobbies 
were filled, and the doors into them from the lecture-room were left open ; the steps 
leading into its area were all occupied ; many persons, to obtain seats, came an hour 
before the time. The next year galleries were erected, which had never before been re- 
quired, and the success was complete. He continued to lecture there for three con- 
secutive years." 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 71 

These verses alluded to were a beautiful little song of Mrs Opie's, 
" Go, youth beloved, in distant glades : " and, in a letter 10 my 
mother, she gives an amusing account of my father suddenly tell- 
ing her, as she met him at the entrance of the lecture-room, that 
he was going to quote it. She describes the struggle between her 
timidity and her vanity, whether she should enter ; and the new 
light in which both she and her poem seemed to shine in the eyes 
of her friends, after this notice of its beauty in his lecture. 

Mr Horner, in his Life, speaks of these Lectures, calling my 
father by the nom de guerre he bore in their circle, of the Bishop of 
Mickleham, — the name of his friend Mr Sharpe's cottage in Surrey, 
where they often assembled. 

" His Lordship's success has been beyond all possible conjec- 
ture : — from six to eight hundred hearers, not a seat to be procured, 
even if you go there an hour before the time. Nobody else, to be 
sure, could have executed such an undertaking with the least 
chance of success. For who could make such a mixture of odd 
paradox, quaint fun, manly sense, liberal opinions, and striking 
language ? " 

Since my father's death, the Lectures (a considerable portion of 
which was fortunately rescued by my mother from the flames, to 
which he had as usual condemned them) have been given to the 
public, which has confirmed the opinion of his friend Horner. 
Lord Jeffrey, to whom they were submitted in manuscript, at first 
dissuaded their publication ; but, on receiving a printed copy, with 
his usual candour and sweetness of disposition, he wrote to my 
mother, only three days before the fatal illness which terminated 
his noble life : — " I am now satisfied that, in what I then said, I 
did great and grievous injustice to the merit of these lectures, and 
was quite wrong in dissuading their publication, or concluding 
they would add nothing to the reputation of the author ; on the 
contrary, my firm impression is, that, with few exceptions, they 
will do him as much credit as anything he ever wrote, and produce 
on the whole a stronger impression of the force and vivacity of his 
intellect, as well as a truer and more engaging view of his char- 
acter, than most of what the world has yet seen of his writings." 

The following lines have been kindly sent me by Miss Berry's 
executor, Sir Frankland Lewis, as found amongst her papers ; and 
as Miss Berry, from her talents, beauty, and high character, her 
friendship with Horace Walpole, her ninety years of life (thus as it 
were connecting two centuries), and the distinguished society 
always to be found at her house, almost belongs to history, these 
lines possess a value independent of their intrinsic merits. 



72 MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH, 



ODE BY MISS EERRV, 

ON .BUYING A NEW BONNET TO GO TO ONE OF MR SYDNEY SMITH 1 
" ON THE SUBLIME." 

Lo I where the gaily-vestured throng, 
Fair Learning's train, are seen, 

■Wedged in close ranks her walls along, 
And up her benches green 1 

Unfolded to their mental eye 

Thy awful form, Sublimity, 

The moral teacher shows ; 
Sublimity ! of silence born, 
And solitude, 'mid " caves forlorn," 

And dimly-vision'd woes, 

Or steadfast worth that, inly great, 

Mocks the malignity of fate. 

Whisper'd Pleasure's dulcet sound 
Murmurs the crowded room around, 
And Wisdom, borne on Fashion's pinion, 
Exulting hails her new dominion. 
Oh ! both on me your influence shed ; 
Dwell in my heart, and deck my head ! 

Where'er a broader, browner shade 

The shaggy beaver throws, 
And with the ample feather's aid, 

O'er-canopies the nose ; 
Where'er, with smooth and silken pile, 
Lingering in solemn pause awhile, 

The crimson velvet glows ; 
From some high bench's giddy brink, 
With me, my friend begins to think, 

As bolt upright we sit, 
That dress, like dogs, should have its day, 
That beavers are too hot for May, 

And velvets quite unfit. 
Then Taste, in maxims sweet, I draw 

From her unerring lip — 
" How light, how simple are the straw ! 

How delicate the chip ! " 

Hush'd is the speaker's powerful voice, 

The audience melt away ; 
I fly to fix my final choice, 

And bless the instructive day. 

The milliner officious pours 

Of hats and caps her ready stores, 

The unbought elegance of spring. 
Some, wide, disclose the full round face , 
Some, shadowy, lend a modest grace, 

And stretch their sheltering wing. 
Here clustering grapes appear to shed 
Their luscious juices on the head, 

And cheat the longing eye : 
So round the Phrygian monarch hung 
Fair fruits, that from his parched tongue 

For ever seemed to fly 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 73 

Here early blooms the summer rose ; 
Here ribbons wreathe fantastic bows ; 
There plays gay plumage of a thousand dyes.— 
Visions of beauty, spare my aching eyes ! 

Ye cumbrous fashions, crowd not on my head ! 

Mine be the chip of purest white, 

Swan-like, and as her feathers light, 
When on the still wave spread ; 

And let it wear the graceful dress 

Of unadorned simplcness 1 
Ah, frugal wish ! Ah, pleasing thought ! 

Ah, hope indulged in vain ! 
Of modest fancy cheaply bought, 

A stranger yet to Payne • 
With undissembled grief I tel!, 

(For sorrow never comes too late), 
The simplest bonnet in Pall Mall 

Is sold for one pound eight. 

To calculation's sober view, 

That searches every plan, 
Who keep the old, or buy the new, 

Shall end where they began. 
Alike the shabby and the gay 
Must meet the sun's meridian ray, 

The air — the dust— the damp : 
This, shall the sudden shower despoil, 
That, slow decay by gradual soil, 

Those, envious boxes cramp. 

Who will, their squander'd gold may pay, 

Who will, our taste deride ; 
We '11 scorn the fashion of the day 

With philosophic pride. 

Methinks we thus, in accents low, 

Might Sydney Smith address : — 
" Poor moralist ! and what art thou, 

Who never spoke of dress ? 
Thy mental hero never hung 
Suspended on a tailor's tongue, 

In agonising doubt ! 
Thy tale no fluttering female show'd, 
Who languish'd for the newest mode, 

Yet dares to live without 1 " * 

The proceeds of these lectures,— for which, after the first series, 
he was allowed to name his own terms, — enabled him to furnish 
his new house in Orchard Street, where he continued to live during 
the remainder of his residence in London, and where two more 
children were born to him ; his son Douglas, and his youngest 
daughter, Emily. 

In this house, though from the various sources mentioned his 

* I find that these verses have been erroneously attributed to Miss Berry ; they were 
really written by her friend Miss C. Fanshawe, on the occasion of one of my father's 
lectures, and sent by her to Miss Berry. 



74 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

means were slightly increased, yet he still remained poor. But it 
was poverty in its most pleasing form ; not the struggle with 
wealth, the false shame, the outward show, the constant seeming, 
which we so often witness in the world, and which form the real 
sting of poverty ; but it was the poverty of a man of sense who 
respected himself. 

All was consistent about him : the comfort and happiness of 
home he considered as the " grammar of life ; " and his house, 
although plain, often in every sense of the word, was all his life the 
perfection of comfort. Regarding domestic comfort as so import- 
ant, he thought no trouble too great, no detail too small, to merit 
his attention ; and, although brought up in wealth and luxury, 
affection soon taught his wife to second him. He never affected 
to be what he was not. He never concealed the thought, labour, 
and struggle it often cost him to obtain the simple comforts of life 
for those he loved ; and as to its luxuries, he exercised the most 
rigid self-denial. In such matters, his favourite motto, which 
through life he inculcated on his family, was, " Avoid shame, but 
do not seek glory : nothing so expensive as glory ; " and this he 
applied to every detail of his establishment. Nothing could be 
plainer than his table, yet his society often attracted the wealthy 
to share his single dish. Mr Horner writes to Lady Mackintosh, 
" My best hours are still spent where I have often met you, espe- 
cially in Doughty Street." 

The pleasantest society at his house was to be found at the little 
weekly suppers which he established ; giving a general invitation 
to about twenty or thirty persons, who used to come when they 
pleased ; and occasionally adding to, or varying them by 
accidental or invited guests. At these suppers there was no 
attempt at display, nothing to tempt the palate ; but they were most 
eagerly sought after ; and were I to begin enumerating the guests 
usually found there, no one would wonder that they were so. 
There are still a few living who can look back to them, and I have 
always found them to do so with a sigh of regret. There was no 
restraint but that of good taste,— no formality, — a happy mixture 
of men and women, the foolish and the wise, the grave and the gay, 
— and sometimes conversation was varied by music. Horner men- 
tions in his " Memoir w one of these evenings, saying, " At Sydney 
Smith's the happiest day I remember to have ever spent ; Mackin- 
tosh, Wishaw, Sharp, Rogers, and three interesting women of 
unlike characters." It is stated in the Life of Sir James Mackin- 
tosh, that a great part of this choice little society used to meet like- 
wise every week at Sir James's house ; and one present says, 
"These social meetings left so delightful an impression on the 
minds of all those who composed them, that many plans were 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 75 

formed, even some years after, to renew them on Sir James's 
return to England ; but, alas ! no pleasure is renewed." 

To these suppers occasionally came a country cousin of my 
father's, — a simple, warm-hearted rustic ; and she used to come up 
to him and whisper, " Now, Sydney, I know these are all very re- 
markable men ; do tell me who they are." " Oh yes," said Sydney, 
laughing, " that is Hannibal," pointing to Mr Wishaw ; " he lost 
his leg in the Carthaginian war ; and that is Socrates," pointing to 
Luttrell; "and that is Solon," pointing to Horner, — "you have 
heard of Solon ? " The girl opened her ears, eyes, and mouth with 
admiration, half doubting, half believing that Sydney was making 
fun of her ; but perfectly convinced that if they were not the indi- 
viduals in question, they were something quite as great. 

It was on occasion of one of these suppers that Sir James Mack- 
intosh happened to bring with him a raw Scotch cousin, an ensign 
in a Highland regiment. On hearing the name of his host, he sud- 
denly turned round, and, nudging Sir James, said in an audible 
whisper, " Is that the great Sir Sudney ? " " Yes, yes," said Sir 
James, much amused ; and giving my father the hint, on the instant 
he assumed the military character, performed the part of the hero 
of Acre to perfection, fought all his battles over again, and showed 
how he had charged the Turks, to the infinite delight of the young 
Scotchman, who was quite enchanted with the kindness and conde- 
scension of " the great Sir Sudney," as he called him, and to the 
absolute torture of the other guests, who were bursting with sup- 
pressed laughter at the scene before them. At last, after an even- 
ing of the most inimitable acting on the part both of my father and 
Sir James, nothing would serve the young Highlander but setting 
off, at twelve o'clock at night, to fetch the piper of his regiment, to 
pipe to " the great Sir Sudney," who said he had never heard the 
bagpipes ; upon which the whole party broke up and dispersed in- 
stantly, for Sir James said his Scotch cousin would infallibly cut 
his throat if he discovered his mistake. A few days afterwards, 
when Sir James Mackintosh and his Scotch cousin were walking in 
the streets, they met my father with my mother on his arm. He 
introduced her as his wife, upon which the Scotch cousin said in a 
low voice to Sir James, and looking at my mother, " I did na ken 
the great Sir Sudney was married." " Why, no," said Sir James, a 
little embarrassed, and winking at him, "not ex-act-ly married"; 
only an Egyptian slave he brought over with him ; Fatima — you 
know— you understand." My mother was long known in the little 
circle as Fatima. 

By this time many of his Scotch friends had likewise come to 
England, which offered a wider field for the exercise of their 
talents : Horner, Lord Webb Seymour, Mr Brougham, and others, 



76 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

were his intimate friends, and contributed much to the charm of 
his little suppers. 

He was early elected a member of a very agreeable dining club, 
calling itself by the modest title of The King of Clubs, to which he 
often alludes with pleasure in his letters ; but it was not until the 
year 1838 that he was admitted into that remarkable literary club 
established by Dr Johnson and his friends, calling itself The Club, 
of which Dr Johnson says, "There is no club like our club." On 
its books may be seen the names, not only of Johnson, Goldsmith, 
Sir Joshua Reynolds, Burke, Gibbon, &c. ; but a list of all the most 
eminent men that England has produced in every rank of society 
since its foundation. M. Van de Weyer, the Belgian Minister is, I 
believe, the only foreigner who has ever been admitted ; and, as 
was observed to him, on his admission, by a distinguished member 
of the club, he has received the highest title of naturalisation that 
it is in the power of this country to bestow. 

My father was now, with many of his early friends, contributing 
largely to the Edinburgh Review ; and as his powers and his prin- 
ciples became more known, he of course became more and more 
obnoxious to the party in power, and was the object of much abuse 
and misrepresentation. One of the earliest recollections I have, is 
that of being stopped at our door, when returning from a walk, by 

Mr , who desired me to tell my father that the King had been 

reading his reviews, and had said, " He was a very clever fellow, 
but that he would never be a bishop." He felt this abuse and mis- 
representation ; and the hopelessness of his situation, where, in his 
profession, no merit or exertion of his own could advance him a 
single step, and where his only alternative was poverty or baseness. 
But he seldom allowed this feeling to depress him ; for he thought, 
with his sensible friend Sharpe, " If you cannot be happy in one 
way, be happy in another. Many in this world run after felicity, 
like an absent man hunting for his hat, while all the time it is on 
his head or in his hand." And he used to say, " One must look 
downwards as well as upwards in human life. Though many have 
passed you in the race, there are many you have left behind. 
Better a dinner of herbs and a pure conscience, than the stalled ox 
and infamy, is my version." 

An anecdote has lately reached me from a very early friend, 
which has quite delighted me ; it is an example of what I observed 
in my father through life, — that having once made up his mind as 
to what he ought to do, he did it, be the consequences what they 
might to himself. It was on this principle that he entered the 
Church, and on this he acted in it, as well as on every important 
occasion of his private life. He was going to preach at the 
Foundling Hospital, and had selected a sermon containing a 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 77 

strong attack upon certain opinions which he thought were rapidly 
increasing, and producing most injurious effects on religion. My 
mother saw and knew the sermon, and exclaimed, " Oh, Sydney, 
do change that sermon ; I know- it will give such offence to our 

friends the F 's, should they be there this evening." " I fear 

it will," said my father, "and am sorry for it; but, Kate, do you 
think, if I feel it my duty to preach such a sermon at all, that I 
can refrain from doing so from the fear of giving offence ?" The 
sermon was preached, and the offence was given. He felt the loss 
of his friends deeply, for he loved and valued those whom he had 
offended. Time, however, produced its usual effects on really good 
men : my father lived to regain their friendship, and I have reason 
to believe there are few who love or honour his memory more than 
the only survivor now left of that family. 

In the year 1807 he preached a sermon on Toleration, in the 
Temple Church, and was requested to publish it. He did so, and 
added the following preface : 

" This sermon is not published from a belief that it has any 
merit in composition, or any claim to originality of thinking, but to 
bear my share of testimony against a religious clamour, which is 
very foolish in. all those in whom it is not very wicked. 

" I am sorry to write what I know it has been extremely dis- 
agreeable to many of those before whom I am in the habit of 
preaching to hear, but I should be infinitely more sorry that this or 
any other apprehension should prevent me from doing what I 
believe to be my duty. 

" Charity towards those who dissent from us on religious 
opinions is always a proper subject for the pulpit. If such dis- 
cussions militate against the views of any particular party, the 
fault is not in him who is thus erroneously said to introduce 
politics into the Church, but in those who have really brought the 
Church into politics. It does not cease to be our duty to guard 
men against religious animosities, because it suits the purpose of 
others to inflame them ; nor are we to consider the great question 
of religious toleration as a theme fit only for the factions of Parlia- 
ment, because intolerance has lately been made the road to 
power. It is no part of the duty of a clergyman to preach upon 
subjects purely political, but it is not therefore his duty to avoid 
religious subjects which have been distorted into political subjects, 
especially when the consequence of that distortion is a general 
state of error and of passion." 

Meanwhile he had the satisfaction of feeling that he was not 
leading a useless life. He writes : — " It pleases me sometimes 
to think of the very great number of important subjects which 



73 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

have been discussed in the Edinburgh Review in so enlightened a 
manner ; it is a sort of magazine of liberal sentiments, which I 
hope will be read by the rising generation, and infuse into them a 
proper contempt for their parents' stupid and unphilosophical 
prejudices." He had also the consolation, as his character dis- 
played itself, of obtaining what he said was the one " earthly good 
worth struggling for, the love and esteem of many good and great 
men." Among these, the two most intimately associated with his 
career in after-life were Lord Grey and Lord Carlisle (then Lord 
Morpeth). To the constant affection and unvarying kindness of 
Lord Holland and these two friends, he was indebted for most of 
the pleasures that were shed upon a path which, to a man of less 
energy of character and buoyancy of spirits, would have been for 
many years a dark and dreary one. But there was within himself 
a natural source of happiness — a perpetual flow of spirits — a 
cheerfulness of disposition, for which he often thanked God, as one 
of the greatest benefits conferred upon him. 

At this period of his life, indeed, his spirits were often such that 
they were more like the joyousness and playfulness of a clever 
schoolboy than the sobriety and gravity of the father of a family ; 
and his gaiety was so irresistible and so infectious, that it carried 
everything before it. Nothing could withstand the contagion of 
that ringing, joy-inspiring laugh, which seemed to spring from the 
fresh, genuine enjoyment he felt at the multitude of unexpected 
images which sprang up in his mind, and succeeded each other 
with a rapidity that hardly allowed his hearers to follow him, but 
left them panting and exhausted with laughter, to cry out for 
mercy. 

An amusing instance of this occurred once, when he met that 
Queen of Tragedy, Mrs Siddons, for the first time. She seemed 
determined to resist him, and preserve her tragic dignity ; but 
after a vain struggle she yielded to the general infection, and flung 
herself back in her chair, in such a fearful paroxysm of laughter, 
and of such long continuance, that it made quite a scene, and all 
the company were alarmed. 

He contrived to make the most commonplace subjects amusing, 
and carried everybody along with him, in his wildest flights of 
drollery. One evening, the subject of conversation was the meteoro- 
logical turn of mind of the English. " What would become of us 
had it pleased Providence to make the weather unchangeable? 
Think of the state of destitution of the morning callers. Now, I 
will give you a specimen of their conversation : Mrs Jackson and 
Mrs Jones, two respectable ancient females, shall be calling upon 
Mrs Green, and Mrs Brown shall join their party, and return by 
moonlight ; Mrs Brown shall catch cold and expire in the arms of 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 79 

her friend, calling for peppermint water, and exclaiming, The moon ! 
the moon!" And taking up his pen, partly from his comical 
delight in what he was doing, partly from the exquisite common- 
places he strung together, and the picture he drew of a morning 
visit in England, he kept us all in such roars of laughter, and 
laughed so heartily himself as he wrote, that we all went exhausted 
to bed. The very recollection of the scene, even at this distance 
of time, makes me laugh again as I write. 

Another day he came home, with two hackney-coach loads of 
pictures, which he had met with at an auction ; having found it 
impossible to resist so many yards of brown-looking figures and 
faded landscapes going " for absolutely nothing, unheard-of sacri- 
fices." Kate hardly knew whether to laugh or to cry, when she 
saw these horribly dingy objects enter her pretty little drawing- 
room, and looked at him as if she thought him half mad. And 
half mad he was, but with delight at his purchase ; he kept walking 
up and down the room, waving his arms, putting them in fresh 
lights, declaring they were exquisite specimens of art, and, if not by 
the very best masters, merited to be so. He invited all his friends, 
displayed the pictures at his suppers, insisted upon their being 
looked at and admired in every point of view, discovered fresh 
beauties for each new comer ; and for three or four days, under 
the magic influence of his wit and imagination, these gloomy old 
paintings were a perpetual scource of amusement and fun. 

At last, finding he was considered no authority in the fine arts, and 
that his pictures made no progress in public opinion, off they went, 
to my mother's great relief, as suddenly as they came, to another 
auction ; but all first rechristened by himself, amidst his laughing 
friends with names never before heard of. One, I remember, was 
"a beautiful landscape, by Nicholas de Falda, a pupil of Valdeggio, 
the only painting by that eminent artist." The pictures sold, I 
believe, for rather less than he gave for them under their original 
names, which were probably as real as their assumed ones. 

On another occasion he took it into his head to make a crusade 
against an unfortunate Mrs Dumplin, who was filled with the ambi- 
tion of giving a rout. He found everybody going away from his 
house, and all to Mrs Dumplin's rout ; upon which he reasoned, 
he laughed, he persuaded, he quizzed, he entreated, he painted and 
described in such glowing colours the horrors of a Dumplin rout — 
the heat, the crowd, the bad lemonade, the ignominy of appearing 
next day in the i Morning Post,' — that at last, with one accord, all 
turned back, finding it impossible to leave him. He shouted 
victory, and Mrs Dumplin was heard of no more. 

Yet in the midst of all this wild mirth and genuine enjoyment 
of youth and health, a pretty domestic trait occurs to my mind. 



8o MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

which, relating to such a man, then the idol of the London world, 
deserves to be told. One of his little children, then in delicate 
health, had for some time been in the habit of waking suddenly 
every evening ; sobbing, anticipating the death of parents, and all 
the sorrows of life, almost before life had begun. He could not 
bear this unnatural union of childhood and sorrow, and for a long 
period, I have heard my mother say, each evening found him, at 
the waking of his child, with a toy, a picture-book, a bunch of 
grapes, or a joyous tale, mixed with a little strengthening advice 
and the tenderest caresses, until the habit was broken, and the child 
woke to joy and not to sorrow. 

These are some of the little nothings which he had the art to 
turn into somethings, but which, I fear, resume their original in- 
significance under my pen ; for I feel it impossible to give to them 
the life and raciness they had in reality, and which constituted their 
chief charm. 



CHAPTER V. 

Political Changes— Obtains Preferment— Goes to S onning— Writes Peter Plymley— Its 
Effect — Makes the Acquaintance of Lord Stowell— Revisits Edinburgh— Goes to 
Howick— No House on the Living — Non-residence permitted — The Passing of the 
Residence Bill— Goes to see the Living — Difficulties — Returns to London— Pub- 
lishes Sermons — Removes Family to Yorkshire — Tries to negotiate Exchange of 
Living— Difficulties of Exchange— Necessity of Building— Settles at Heslington. 

In 1806 those political changes took place which so unexpectedly, 
and for so short a period, brought the Whigs into power. 

To one who, as he says, " had lived so long on the north side of 
the wall, this ray of sunshine was very cheering, and gave some 
hopes that he who had so well and so honestly fought the good 
fight, would now have some opportunity afforded him of exerting 
himself in his profession." But as he had no connexions and little 
political interest, I do not know that he would have derived any 
advantage from the change, had it not been for the indefatigable 
exertions of his friends at Holland House, who never rested until 
they saw justice done to him, and had obtained for him, from the 
Chancellor, Lord Erskine, the living of Foston-le-Clay, in Yorkshire. 

For this he always felt that he owed Lord and Lady Holland a 
deep debt of gratitude ; as, in addition to the immediate increase 
of his income, being a permanent provision, it gave him the first 
feeling of independence and security that he had enjoyed after a 
life of anxiety and uncertainty. An old friend of my father's wrote 
to me the other day : — " I was present at Bishopthorpe when your 
father first came down to be inducted to the living of Foston (now 
nearly fifty years ago), under the reign of old Archbishop Markham. 
I was then so young as to be placed at the side-table in that large 
dining-room ; but I well remember the unwonted animation and 
the brilliant conversation that constantly attracted our attention to 
the great table, and which we were told proceeded from a young 
clergyman of the name of Sydney Smith, just come down to take 
possession of a living in Yorkshire. When he went away, the old 
Archbishop, I could see, though struck with his extraordinary 
abilities, did not half like, or understand, how one of the inferior 
clergy should be so much in possession of his faculties in the pre- 
sence of his diocesan. On my return home the next day I found 
my family in a state of great excitement. They had just, they said, 
had a long visit from the most delightful person they had ever met, 

F 



82 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

a Mr S. Smith, who had brought letters of introduction from Lord 
Abinger, then Mr Scarlett, saying that the bearer was one of the 
most distinguished young men then in London, and congratulating 
my mother on the probability of having such a man established in 
her neighbourhood ; a piece of good fortune which, when it did 
happen shortly after, she fully appreciated, and was not inclined to 
neglect. From this time we saw more and more of him; and 
although I have enjoyed now all that is best in life, I think if I were 
to select the day of my life that has left the most agreeable impres- 
sion on my mind, it would be a long summer afternoon we all spent 

with your father at Heslington. We walked over with Lord 

and several of the lawyers of the Northern Circuit, and found a 
Mrs Hamilton in the house, who had just come from Edinburgh. 
The weather was lovely, everything looked bright, your father and 

Lord were in the highest spirits. The conversation turned 

on Edinburgh, the mode of life there, the remarkable men it con- 
tained or had produced ; it was most brilliant and interesting — the 
first taste I had had of what I must still think the perfection of 
society. After dinner we all walked back by moonlight. I have 
never forgotten that day ; I think it was one of the happiest of my 
life, and this has not been an unhappy one, as you know." 

In the summer of 1807 he took his family for a short time to a 
little cottage in the village of Sonning, near Reading, to give them 
their first taste of the country ; and even now I recollect with de- 
light " each rural sight, each rural sound," — the first breath of air, 
free from carpet-shakings, that we had inhaled. 

I believe it was about this period that a letter from Peter Plymley 
to his brother Abraham, on the subject of the Irish Catholics, 
appeared suddenly in the London world. Its effect, I have been 
told, was like a spark on a heap of gunpowder. It was instantly 
dispersed all over London, was to be found on every table, spread 
in every direction over the country, and was the topic of general 
conversation and conjecture. It was quickly followed by another 
and another. Each fresh letter increased the eagerness and 
curiosity of the public. Every effort was made on the part of the 
Government to find out the author, — in vain : the secret was well 
kept. It is true, strong suspicion pointed toward the little village 
in which my father then resided, and a few of those best acquainted 
with his style felt convinced that there was but one man in England 
who could so write, — who could make the most irresistible wit and 
pleasantry the vehicle of sound and unanswerable argument ; but 
no proof could be obtained. The editions were bought up as fast 
as they could be printed, and I am afraid from memory to state the 
numbers that were sold. 

At the request of the Catholics, cheaper editions were printed, 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 83 

for dispersion in Ireland. Few works, I have heard, ever did more 
to open men's minds to the absurdity and danger of the system 
then pursued by England;* and there are, or rather were, few 
Catholics who did not venerate the name of Sydney Smith, as one 
who, though an honest servant of another church, felt that the 
strongest tenet of that church was charity and mercy, and who, 
with this feeling, laboured incessantly to remove the heavy burdens 
and disqualifications then imposed on them by the laws. And let 
no man say that he laboured in vain ; that the seeds he sowed have 
not brought forth fruit, though not all the fruit they would have 
produced had they been sown when they were offered. 

All admit that much has still to be done, and much time must 
elapse before such sufferings can be forgotten. But look what Ire- 
land was when my father first entered life, in the midst of the 
tumult and violence of the French Revolution, and look at what it 
has been of late ; look at what he advised, and how he advised it ; 
look at what has been done ; and who will then say that the efforts 
of such a man were unavailing, that his honest labours were in 
vain, that he who from early youth to the hour of his death dedi- 
cated the fine talents God had given him to spread religious tolera- 
tion, has not done good in his generation ? I believe that his 
memory will live with the good men of every land, and that his 
best monument will be the love and respect of his countrymen. 

Referring, some time after my father had left London for York- 
shire, to Peter Plymley, Lord Holland writes to him from Drop- 
more : — 

" My dear Sydney, 

" I wish you could have heard my conversation with Lord Gren- 
ville the other day, and the warm and enthusiastic way in which 
he spoke of Peter Plymley. I did not fail to remind him that the 
only author to whom we both thought it could be compared in 
English, lost a bishopric for his wittiest performance ; and I hoped 
that, if we could discover the author, and had ever a bishopric in 
our gift, we should prove that Whigs were both more grateful and 
more liberal than the Tories. 

" He rallied me upon the affectation of concealing who it was, 
but added that he hoped Peter would not always live in Yorkshire ; 
for among other reasons, we felt the want of him just now in the 
state of the press, and that he wished to God Abraham would do 
something to provoke him to take up the pen again." 

* Lord Holland, I see, bears witness to the powerful effect this work and the Edin- 
burgh Review had on the Catholic question, in his Reminiscences of that period; 
and Lord Murray, in writing of it, says, " After Pascal's Letters it is the most instruc- 
tive piece of wisdom in the form of irony ever written, and had the most important and 
lasting effects." 



34 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

In the little village of Sonning my father first made the ac- 
quaintance of Sir William Scott, afterwards Lord Stowell, then 
our nearest neighbour, whose society he found most agreeable. 
Although differing on almost every point of politics, he fully appre- 
ciated my father, and eagerly sought his acquaintance, not only- 
then, but during the remainder of my father's life, whenever oppor- 
tunity offered in London ; and during the period of this intercourse 
he not unfrequently said, " Ah, Mr Smith, you would have been in 
a different situation, and a far richer man, if you would have be- 
longed to us." This observation, from one so cautious, so saga- 
cious, and so strong a politician as Lord Stowell, was, of course, 
gratifying to my father, as it showed that his powers and talents 
were felt and appreciated by his political opponents. 

On his return to town, receiving an invitation, I believe from his 
friend Mr Sharp, to dine with him at Fishmongers' Hall, he sent 
the following playful answer, which, trifling as it is, as my tale is 
made up of trifles, I shall give. 

" Much do I love, at civic treat, 
The monsters of the deep to eat ; 
To see the rosy salmon lying, 
By smelts encircled, born for frying ; 
And from the china boat to pour, 
On flaky cod, the favour'd shower. 
Thee, above all, I much regard, 
Flatter than Longman's flattest bard, 
Much honour'd turbot ! — sore I grieve 
Thee and thy dainty friends to leave. 
Far from ye all, in snuggest corner, 
I go to dine with little Horner : 
He who, with philosophic eye, 
Sat brooding o'er his Christmas pie : 
Then, firm resolved, with either thumb 
Tore forth the crust-enveloped plum, 
And, mad with youthful dreams of future fame, 
Proclaim'd the deathless glories of his name." 

In the autumn of this year, 1808, he paid a short visit to his old 
haunts in Edinburgh, and on his return visited for the first time 
Lord Rosslyn and Lord Grey. He saw the latter (where he was 
ever best seen) in the midst of his family at Howick ; and the 
foundation of that friendship was then laid, which was a constant 
source of pleasure and gratification to him in after-life, and ended 
only with his death. 

As there was no house upon his living, and no means of pro- 
curing one in the neighbourhood, and the population of the parish 
was small, Dr Markham, the Archbishop of York, permitted his 
continued residence in town, on condition of his appointing an 
efficient curate. In 1808, however, the passing of the Residence 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 85 

Bill by Mr Perceval, — a bill most just in its intentions, and most 
unjust in its effects, — compelled him to resign or build. 

In consequence of the blamable negligence on the subject ot 
residence of the clergy, which had existed for so long a period in 
the Church, one-third of the parsonage-houses in England had 
gone to decay. By the effects of this bill, one generation of clergy- 
men were compelled suddenly to atone for the accumulated sins of 
their predecessors, and to benefit their successors, by building 
parsonage-houses out of their own private fortunes ; unaided, save 
by a sum (I think two or three years' income of the living) which 
they were allowed to. borrow from Queen Anne's Bounty. Of this 
sum they were to repay a portion every year, with interest upon the 
rest ; and thus if they retained the living a few years, they were 
obliged to refund the whole sum, and it was utterly lost to them 
and their families. 

On receiving the startling summons from the Archbishop, my 
father immediately went down into Yorkshire to learn his fate. 
He found that his living well deserved its name of Foston-le-Clay, 
consisting as it did of three hundred acres of glebe-land of the 
stiffest clay, in a remote village of Yorkshire. There had not been 
a resident clergyman for a hundred and fifty years, owing to the 
wretched state of the hovel which had once been the parsonage- 
house. This consisted of one brick-floored kitchen, with a room 
above it, which was in so dangerous a condition that the farmer, 
who had occupied it hitherto, declined living in it any longer ; it 
opened on one side into a foal-yard, and on the other into the 
churchyard. There was no society in the village above the rank 
of a farmer. The parishioners were so unaccustomed to the sights 
of civilised life, that they could hardly recover from their surprise 
at the sight of a gentleman from London in a superfine coat and a 
four-wheeled carriage. 

The prospect, it must be allowed, was not cheering, either 
morally or physically, for the country was as unpromising as the 
house. The clerk, the most important man in the village, was 
summoned, — a man who had numbered eighty years, looking, with 
his long gray hair, his threadbare coat, deep wrinkles, stooping 
gait, and crutch-stick, more ancient than the parsonage-house. 
He looked at my father for some time from under his gray shaggy 
eyebrows, and held a long conversation with him, in which the old 
clerk showed that age had not quenched the natural shrewdness 
of the Yorkshireman. At last, after a pause, he said, striking his 
crutch-stick on the ground, " Muster Smith, it often stroikes moy 

moind, that people as comes frae London is such fools 

But you," he said (giving him a nudge with his stick), " I see you 
are no fool." Having thus gained the respect of the old, prejudiced 



86 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH 

clerk, he endeavoured to prove himself no fool. He examined care- 
fully and understood thoroughly all the difficulties of his position, 
namely, a house to be built without experience or money ; a family 
and furniture to be moved into the heart of Yorkshire, — a process, 
in the year 1808, as difficult as a journey to the back settlements 
of America now to a man of small means : the absolute necessity 
of becoming a farmer, the living consisting of land and no tithe, 
there being no farm-buildings on it to enable him to let it ; and the 
profound ignorance of all agricultural pursuits inevitable to a man 
who had passed life hitherto in towns, and whose time and atten- 
tion had been divided between preaching, literature, and society. 
Add to these, the moral difficulty of breaking through all the habits 
of his life, and tearing himself from the many valuable friends he 
had by this time formed, and who delighted in his society. But 
he felt it a duty, both to his profession and family, that the effort 
should be made. 

He returned immediately to London, and obtained the means of 
transporting his family and furniture, by the publication of two 
volumes of the sermons he had preached with so much success 
during his residence there. The means obtained, and the order of 
march arranged, he set about breaking up his little establishment 
in London, which was not effected without great opposition from 
his friends, and many kind attempts and schemes to detain him 
amongst them. 

We all left town in the summer of 1809. He preceded the party, 
and hired for their reception a small but cheerful house in a village 
about two miles from York ; from whence, not having been able to 
procure a house nearer, he proposed to do the duties of his living 
for the present, whilst he endeavoured, with the consent of Dr 
Vernon Harcourt (the present Archbishop of York), to negotiate 
an exchange of the living, and thus to avoid the necessity of 
building. 

Lord Eldon required that a chancery living should only be ex- 
changed for another chancery living, and that the parties so 
exchanging should be exactly of the same age. These conditions 
rendered exchange almost impossible ; but to one with such slender 
means, it was worth any effort, to avoid the ruinous expense of 
building. He therefore exerted himself in every possible way, and 
began several negotiations, but they were all unsuccessful. 



CHAPTER VI. 

Establishment in Yorkshire— Habits— Mode of Life— Plans of Study— Attention to 
Children — Power of Abstraction — Farmers' Dinner — Medical Anecdotes — Experi- 
ments — Extracts from Diary — Practical Essays — Metaphysical Essays — Hints for 
History — Letter from Mr Macaulay — Sir Samuel Romilly's Visit — Sermon on his 
Death — Anecdote of Roasted Quaker — Dining out in the Country — Return of his 
Brother and Sir J. Mackintosh from India — Madame de Stael's visit to England- 
Typhus Fever — Lines on Mr Jeffrey. 

OUR first establishment at Heslington was a great source of en- 
joyment to the younger part of the family, glad to escape from the 
confinement of London ; and our happiness contributed not a little 
to reconcile my father to the change. 

He now began to arrange his mode of life and establishment. 
He bought a little second-hand carriage, and a horse called Peter ; 
and the groom once exclaiming he had a " cruel face," he went 
ever after by the name of Peter the Cruel. In this little carriage 
he used to drive himself and my mother every Sunday, summer 
and winter (for she always accompanied him), to serve his church 
at Foston, and returned late in the evening. 

At first it was not without fear that she entrusted herself to so 
inexperienced a coachman ; " but she soon," he said, " raised my 
wages, and considered me an excellent Jehu." The streets of 
York required some skill in this art. My father once exclaiming 
to one of the principal tradesmen there, " Why, Mr Brown, your 
streets are the narrowest in Europe ; there is not actually room for 
two carriages to pass." " Not room ! " said the indignant Yorkist, 
" there 's plenty of room, Sir, and above an inch and a half to 
spare !" He used to dig vigorously an hour or two every day in 
his garden, " to avoid sudden death," as he said ; for he was even 
then inclined to embonpoint, and perhaps, as a young man, may 
have been considered somewhat clumsy in figure (though I never 
thought so), for I have often heard from my father that a college 
friend used to say, " Sydney, your sense, wit, and clumsiness, always 
give me the idea of an Athenian carter" 

He spent much time in reading and composition. His activity 
was unceasing; I hardly remember seeing him unoccupied, but 
when engaged in conversation. He never considered his education 
as finished; he had always some object in hand to investigate. 



8S MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH- 

He read with great rapidity. I think it was said of Johnson, 
" Look at Johnson, tearing out the bowels of his book." It might 
be said of my father, that he was running off with their contents ; 
for he galloped through the pages so rapidly, that we often laughed 
at him when he shut up a thick quarto as his morning's work, and 
told him that he meant he had looked at it, not read it. " Cross- 
examine me, then," said he ; and we generally found he knew all 
that was worth knowing in it ; though I do not think he had a very 
retentive memory. The same peculiarity characterised his com- 
positions : when he had any subject in hand, he was indefatigable 
in reading, searching, inquiring, seeking every source of informa- 
tion, and discussing it with any man of sense or cultivation who 
crossed his path. But having once mastered it, he would sit down, 
and he might be seen committing his ideas to paper with the same 
rapidity that they flowed out in his conversation, — no hesitation, 
no erasures, no stopping to consider and round his periods, no 
writing for effect, but a pouring out of the fulness of his mind and 
feelings, for he was heart and soul in whatever he undertook. One 
could see by his countenance how much he was interested or 
amused as fresh images came clustering round his pen. He hardly 
ever altered or corrected what he had written (as I find by many 
manuscripts I have of his) ; indeed, he was so impatient of this, 
that he could hardly bear the trouble of even looking it over, but 
would not unfrequently throw the manuscript down on the table 
as soon as finished, and say, starting up, " There, it is clone ; now r , 
Kate, do look it over, and put in dots to the i's and strokes to the 
^s ;" — and he would sally forth to his morning's walk. 

He used frequently to lay out his plans of study for the year. 
The following have accidentally been preserved in one of his com- 
monplace books, and I shall give them here, though not strictly 
belonging to this period : — 

"Plan of Study for 1820. 
" Translate every day ten lines of the ' De Officiis,' and re-tran- 
slate into Latin. Five chapters of Greek Testament. Theological 
studies. Plato's 'Apology for Socrates;' Horace's Epodes, 
Epistles, Satires, and Ars Poetica. 

"Plan of Study for 1821. 

" Write sermons and reviews, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. 
Read, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday. Write ten lines of Latin on 
writing days. Read five chapters of Greek Testament on reading 
days. For morning reading, either Polybius, or Diodorus Siculus, 
or some tracts of Xenophon or Plato; and for Latin, Catullus, 
Tibullus, and Propertius. 

" Monday : write, morning ; read Tasso, evening. Tuesday : 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 89 

Latin or Greek, morning ; evening, theology. Wednesday, same 
as Monday. Friday, ditto. Thursday and Saturday, same as 
Tuesday. Read every day a chapter in Greek Testament, and 
translate ten lines of Latin. Good books to read :— Terrasson's 
' History of Roman Jurisprudence ; ' Bishop of Chester's ' Records 
of the Creation.' " 

My father was very fond of children, and liked to have them 
with him ; indeed, in looking back, it often fills me with regret to 
think of the many advantages which ought to have been turned to 
better account, in passing a life with such a man. He took a 
lively interest in our pursuits and happiness (a happiness which, 
he often touchingly said, he had never known in childhood ;) and 
never lost an opportunity of showing us whatever could instruct or 
amuse, that came within his reach. He loved to exercise our 
minds ; and I remember, that often, in childhood, he gave my elder 
brother and myself subjects on which to write essays for him. He 
encouraged the ceaseless questions of childhood ; he was never too 
busy to explain or assist ; and as we grew older, he endeavoured to 
stimulate us to exertion by shame at ignorance. He loved to dis- 
cuss with us, met us as his equals, and I look back with wonder at 
his patient refutation of our crude and foolish opinions. 

As we grew up we became his companions ; we were called in 
to all family councils, and his letters were common property. The 
tenderest mother could not have been more anxious and careful as 
to the religious tendency of the books we read, and he has often 
taken books out of my hands which I had ignorantly begun, with 
strict injunctions to consult him about my studies. He regarded 
it as the greatest of all evils to produce doubt or confusion in a 
youthful mind on such subjects ; indeed he has said, in his sermons, 
that he*" would a thousand times prefer that his child should die 
in the bloom of youth, rather than it should live to disbelieve." 

After his evening walk he would sit down to his singular writing 
establishment, which I shall describe hereafter, placed by the 
servant always in the same place ; and here, after looking through 
business papers and bills with as much plodding method as an 
attorney's clerk, he would suddenly push them all aside, and, as if 
to refresh his mind, take up his pen. His power of abstraction 
was so great that he would begin to compose, with as much rapidity 
and ease as another man would write a letter, those essays which 
are before the world, or some of those sermons of which my mother 
has given a few to the public since his death ; often reading what 
he had written, listening to our criticisms (as Moliere did to his old 
woman,) and this in the midst of all the conversations and inter- 
ruptions of a family party, with talking or music going on. 



90 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" A clergyman complaining of want of society in the country, 
saying, ' they talk of flints' (young cows), Johnson expressed him- 
self much flattered by the reply of Mrs Thrale's mother : ' Sir, Dr 
Johnson would learn to talk of runts ; ' meaning that I was a man 
that would make the most of my situation, whatever it was."* 
This was most strikingly the case with my father ; he always en- 
deavoured to see the bright side of things, and to adapt himself to 
the circumstances in which he was placed, however uncongenial to 
his former tastes and habits. He could talk of runts with those 
who talked only of runts ; and he not only talked, but entered so 
eagerly into the subject before him, that he generally ended by 
finding sources of interest in them. In this respect he afforded a 
striking contrast to a brother clergyman, who, having been a 
popular preacher in London, received, about the same time, a 
valuable living in Yorkshire, and came down to a good house and 
a more populous neighbourhood than my father's. But alas ! he 
could not talk of runts ; he sighed after Piccadilly ; his face grew 
thinner and longer every time we met. He used often to call, and 
lament over his hard fate, and wonder how my father could 
endure it with so much cheerfulness ; and I believe he would have 
died of green fields and runts, if he had not succeeded in effecting 
an exchange, which restored him again to London. 

Talking of runts reminds me of a practice my father established 
as soon as he was settled at Foston : he invited some of the most re- 
spectable farmers in his neighbourhood to dine with him once a year. 
On these occasions he did not make it a mere men's dinner, but 
the ladies of his family were always present ; and, without lowering 
his own dignity or appearing to descend to the level of his more 
humble guests, it was interesting to observe how he drew out the 
real sense and knowledge they possessed, how he discussed their 
opinions, and with what tact he gave a tone of general interest to 
the conversation. Trifling as this was, it was evidently of great 
utility; it gave him more knowledge of them and influence amongst 
them that he could otherwise have obtained ; each man went away 
better pleased with himself and less of a grumbler than he came, 
and, I suspect, with a greater value for character, which was the 
only passport to his table. 

My father employed himself much in acquiring a knowledge of 
all rural arts and the details of farming, such as baking, brewing, 
fattening poultry, churning, &c. : talking much to the working 
people, whose shrewdness and blunt sense delighted him. He al- 
ways acquired some information from them, often kindly taking up 
some old woman returning from market into his gig and learning 
her history. He said he never found anything well done in a small 

* Boswell's Life of Johnson. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 91 

household, if the master and mistress were ignorant of the mode in 
which it ought to be done. 

He began too on a small scale to exercise his skill in medicine, 
doing much good among his poor neighbours, although there were 
often ludicrous circumstances connected with his early medical 
career. On one occasion, wishing to administer a ball to Pettr the 
Cruel, the groom by mistake, gave him two boxes of opium pills in 
his bran mash, which Peter composedly munched, boxes and all. 
My father, in dismay, when he heard what had happened, went to 
look, as he thought, for the last time on his beloved Peter ; but 
soon found, to his great relief, that neither boxes nor pills had pro- 
duced any visible effects. Another time he found all his pigs in- 
toxicated, and, as he declared, " grunting God save the King about 
the stye," from having eaten some fermented grains which he had 
ordered for them. Once he administered castor-oil to the red cow, 
in quantities sufficient to have killed a regiment of Christians ; but 
the red cow laughed alike at his skill and his oil, and went on her 
way rejoicing. 

He never sat a moment after dinner when alone with his family, 
having contracted a horror of this practice from the long sittings 
inflicted on him in early life by his father ; who, dining at three, 
used to sit till dark, and expect his family to do the same. My 
father rushed into the opposite extreme ; and the cloth was scarcely 
removed ere he called for his hat and stick, and sallied forth for his 
evening stroll, in which we always accompanied him. Each cow, 
and calf, and horse, and pig, were in turn visited, and fed and patted, 
and all seemed to welcome him : he cared for their comforts as he 
cared for the comforts of every living being around him. He used 
to say, "I am all for cheap luxuries, even for animals. Now all 
animals have a passion for scratching their backbones ; they break 
down your gates and palings to effect this. Look, there is my uni- 
versal scratcher, a sharp-edged pole, resting on a high and low post, 
adapted to every height, from a horse to a lamb ; even the Edin- 
burgh Reviewer can take his turn. You have no idea how popular 
it is ; I have not had a gate broken since I put it up. I have it in 
all my fields." 

He always had some experiment going on. At one time he was 
bent on inventing a method of burning the fat of his own sheep, in- 
stead of candles ; and numerous were the little tin lamps produced 
of various forms and sizes ; great the illuminations, and greater the 
smells, the house being redolent of mutton-fat while this fancy 
lasted. Then he took smoky chimneys in hand, and invented 
patent iron backs, to throw out the heat of the fire by contracting 
the chimney, and facilitate sweeping them by the ease of removal ; 
and I am bound in gratitude to own, with much success. 



92 MEM OIK OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Immediately on coming to Foston, as early as the year 1809, he 
set on foot gardens for the poor ; and subsequently, Dutch gardens 
for spade cultivation. The former were, I believe, among the first 
trials of an experiment which has been since so general adopted, as 
one of the most beneficial charities for a country population. He 
divided several acres of the glebe into sixteenths, and let them, at 
a low rent, to the villagers, to whom they were the greatest comfort. 
It became quite a pretty sight afterwards to see these small gardens 
(which were just enough to supply a cottager with potatoes, and 
sometimes enable him to keep a pig) filled at dawn with the women 
and children cultivating them before they went to their day's labour ; 
and there was great emulation among them, whose garden should 
be most productive and obtain the prize. 

Then the cheapest diet for the poor, and cooking for the poor, 
formed the subjects of his inquiry ; and many a hungry labourer 
was brought in and stuffed with rice, or broth, or porridge, to test 
the relative effects of these kinds of food on the appetite. In short, 
it would be endless to enumerate the variety of subjects and objects 
which the activity and energy of his mind suggested and found 
interest, in. Indeed, the last-mentioned subject had attracted his 
attention at a very early period ; for I find, in a letter from Edin- 
burgh, in 1799, ne savs : — "Read Count Rumford's Essays, and 
that in particular which treats of the food of the poor. The 
amazingly small expense at which they can be fed is really surpris- 
ing. I have turned my mind lately to the verification of this essay, 
from the melancholy instance of a poor schoolmaster here, whom 
I found (as there are no Poor-laws in Scotland) starving to death, 
with his wife and four children. I extracted from him, in the course 
of conversation, that some time before, their distresses had been so 
great, that he had taken nothing but two little bits of tobacco from 
Sunday evening to Thursday, in the middle of the day. I asked 
him if there was no bread in the house during that time ? Some 
small pieces of barley bread, he said, which he thought it sacrilege 
to touch, — they were for his family. He told his story with a shame 
and a reluctance which banished all doubt of his truth ; or rather, 
would have banished all doubt, if the famine of his look, his simple, 
unaffected, and modest manner and countenance, had not done it 
before. He understands Latin, French, and Greek. I found him 
regaling, in the true Scriptural style, with a morsel of bread and a 
draught of water. He gets bread once in twenty-four hours, with 
which habit has taught him to be content. He believes in God, 
and says Providence never deserts him. He deserves a little broth, 
and Michael and myself have resolved to give him some." 

In spite of this constant activity on his own part, in alluding to 
the nothings which form the occupations of a country life, he writes 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 93 

to a lady : — " You arc now seriously immersed in all those weighty 
operations which fill up the sum of country life. You are flinging 
barley out to the pigeons ; you are hearing the piteous cluck of 
pea-fowls that have been eaten by foxes ; you have drawn half a 
carnation ; you have observed several times that the grass is green, 
and the May sweet ; you have gaped several times, and pulled 
Caesar by the ears, and heard about eight and thirty stories 
w hich — — and — have to tell you about grandpapa and 
mamma, &c." 

In an evening, often with a child on each knee, he would invent 
a tale for their amusement, composed of such ludicrous images and 
combinations as nobody else would have thought of, succeeding 
each other with the greatest rapidity. These were devoured by 
them with eyes and ears, in breathless interest : but at the most 
thrilling moment he always terminated with "and so they lived 
very happy ever after," a kiss on each fat cheek, " and now go 
to bed." 

The following are extracts from such few portions of his diary 
as have been preserved, written at various times. These slight, 
unfinished fragments are not, of course, given as specimens of 
composition ; but they are, I think, of great value, as indicating 
the occupation and direction of his thoughts, and the wholesome 
training of his mind, in his leisure hours, and in solitude, of which 
he seems to have felt the full value for the improvement of his 
character. In one of his letters to Jeffrey about this period, he 
says : — " Living a great deal alone (as I now do) will, I believe, 
correct me of my faults ; for a man can do without his own appro- 
bation in much society, but he must make great exertions to gain 
it when he is alone ; without it, I am convinced, solitude is not to 
be endured." 

" Maxims and Rules of Life. 

" Remember that every person, however low, has rights and 
feelings. In all contentions, let peace be rather your object, than 
triumph : value triumph only as the means of peace. 

" Remember that your children, your wife, and your servants, 
have rights and feelings ; treat them as you would treat persons 
who could turn again. Apply these doctrines to the administration 
of justice as a magistrate. Rank poisons make good medicines ; 
error and misfortune may be turned into wisdom and improve- 
ment. 

" Do not attempt to frighten children and inferiors by passion ; 
it does more harm to your own character than it does good 
to them ; the same thing is better done by firmness and per- 
suasion. 

"If you desire the common people to treat you as a gentle- 



94 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

man, you must conduct yourself as a gentleman should do to 
them. 

"When you meet with neglect, let it rouse you to exertion, 
instead of mortifying your pride. Set about lessening those 
defects which expose you to neglect, and improve those excellences 
which command attention and respect. 

"Against general fears, remember how very precarious life is, 
take what care you will ; how short it is, last as long as it ever 
does. 

" Rise early in the morning, not only to avoid self-reproach, but 
to make the most of the little life that remains ; not only to save 
the hours lost in sleep, but to avoid that langour which is spread 
over mind and body for the whole of that day in which you have 
lain late in bed. 

" Passion gets less and less powerful after every defeat. Hus- 
band energy for the real demand which the dangers of life make 
upon it. 

" Find fault, when you must find fault, in private, if possible ; 
and some time after the offence, rather than at the time. The 
blamed are less inclined to resist, when they are blamed without 
witnesses; both parties are calmer, and the accused party is 
struck with the forbearance of the accuser, who has seen the 
fault, and watched for a private and proper time for mention- 
ing it." 



" My son writes me word he is unhappy at school. This makes 
me unhappy ; but, Firstly, There is much unhappiness in human 
life : how can school be exempt ? Secondly, Boys are apt to 
take a particular moment of depression for a general feeling, and 
they are in fact rarely unhappy ; at the moment I write, perhaps he 
is playing about in the highest spirits. Thirdly, When he comes to 
state his grievance, it will probably have vanished, or be so trifling, 
that it will yield to argument or expostulation. Fourthly, At all 
events, if it is a real evil which makes him unhappy, I must find 
out what it is, and proceed to act upon it ; but I must wait till I 
can, either in person or by letter, find out what it is." 



"Jan. 19th. I passed very unhappily, from an unpleasant state of 
body produced by indolence. 

" Feb. 15th. Lost two hours in bed from dawdling and doubting. 
Maxims to make one get up ! — 1st. Optimum eligite, et consuetudo 
faciet jucundissimum. 2nd. I must get up at last, it will be as dif- 
ficult then as now. 3rd. By getting up I gain health, knowledge, 
temper, and animal spirits. 

"May 31st. The difficulty of getting up, and I parley with the 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 95 

fault ; the only method is, to obey the rule instantly, and without a 
moment's reflection. 

" Nov. 3rd. Lost a day by indolence ; the only method is to spring 
up at once. 

" I am uneasy about the sort of answer which the editor of the 

has given to my letter ; but as I cannot see his answer, the 

best way is to wait till I can see it ; and after all, it is of very little 
consequence. Every man magnifies too much what belongs to 
himself ; nobody does this more than I do. 

"Another reason for benevolence is, that you forget your own 
joy from being so accustomed to it, but the joy of others seems some- 
thing new. 

" says, ' my best patients are the poor, for God is the pay- 
master/ 

"Death — it must come some time or other. It has come to all, 
greater, better, wiser, than I. 

" I have lived sixty-six years. 

" I have done but very little harm in the world, and I have 
brought up my family. 

" I was seized with sudden giddiness, so as to fall, and for twenty- 
two hours was affected by violent pain. I kept my bed that day, 
and was weak and languid for some days after. Mr Lyddon attri- 
butes it to indigestion. If this is the way nature punishes us for 
the consumption of indigestible food, I am sure it is worth while to 
be strictly temperate ; I will therefore, in future, avoid soup and 
fish, and confine myself to one dish. I must not only attend to 
quantity, but quality. I may not be able to do this, — then I must 
die or be ill ; but I am sure it is best wisdom to do it. 

" Not only is religion calm and tranquil, but it has an extensive 
atmosphere round it, whose calmness and tranquillity must be pre- 
served, if you would avoid misrepresentation. 

" Not only study that those with whom you live should habitually 
respect you, but cultivate such manners as will secure the respect 
of persons with whom you occasionally converse. Keep up the 
habit of being respected, and do not attempt to be more amusing 
and agreeable than is consistent with the preservation of respect. 

" I am come to the age of seventy ; have attained enough repu- 
tation, to make me somebody : I should not like a vast reputation, 
it would plague me to death. I hope to care less for the outward 
world. 

" Don't be too severe upon yourself and your own failings ; keep 
on, don't faint, be energetic to the last. 

" If you wish to keep mind clear and body healthy, abstain from 
all fermented liquors. 

" Fight against sloth, and do all you can to make friends. 



96 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

v " If old ago is even a state of suffering, it is a state of superior 
wisdom, in which man avoids all the rash and foolish things he 
does in his youth, and which make life dangerous and painful. 

" Death must be distinguished from dying, with which it is often 
confounded. 

" Reverence and stand in awe of yourself. 

" How Nature delights and amuses us by varying even the char- 
acter of insects : the ill-nature of the wasp, the sluggishness of the 
drone, the volatility of the butterfly, the slyness of the bug. 

" Take short views, hope for the best, and trust in God." 



"a few unfinished sketches.* 
" Of the Body. 

" Happiness is not impossible without health, but it is of very 
difficult attainment. I do not mean by health merely an absence 
of dangerous complaints, but that the body should be in perfect 
tune — full of vigour and alacrity. 

" The longer I live, the more I am convinced that the apothecary 
is of more importance than Seneca ; and that half the unhappiness 
in the world proceeds from little stoppages, from a duct choked up, 
from food pressing in the wrong place, from a vext duodenum, or 
an agitated pylorus. 

" The deception, as practised upon human creatures, is curious 
and entertaining. Mylriend sups late ; he eats some strong soup, 
then a lobster, then some tart, and he dilutes these esculent varieties 
with wine. The next day I call upon him. He is going to sell his 
house in London, and to retire into the country. He is alarmed 
for his eldest daughter's health. His expenses are hourly increas- 
ing, and nothing but a timely retreat can save him from ruin. All 
this is the lobster : and when over-excited nature has had time to 
manage this testaceous encumbrance, the daughter recovers, the 
finances are in good order, and every rural idea effectually excluded 
from the mind. 

"In the same manner old friendships are destroyed by toasted 
cheese, and hard salted meat has led to suicide. Unpleasant feel- 
ing of the body produce correspondent sensations in the mind, and 
a great scene of wretchedness is sketched out by a morsel of indi- 
gestible and misguided food. Of such infinite consequence to 
happiness is it to study the body ! 

" I have nothing new to say upon the management which the 
body requires. The common rules are the best : — exercise without 
fatigue ; generous living without excess ; early rising, and mode- 

* From his "Practical Essays." 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 97 

ration in sleeping. These are the apothegms of old women ; but 
if they are not attended to, happiness becomes so extremely diffi- 
cult that very few persons can attain to it. In this point of view, 
the care of the body becomes a subject of elevation and import- 
ance. A walk in the fields, an hour's less sleep, may remove all 
those bodily vexations and disquietudes which are such formidable 
enemies to virtue ; and may enable the mind to pursue its own 
resolves without that constant train of temptations to resist, and 
obstacles to overcome, which it always experiences from the bad 
organization of its companion. Johnson says, every man is a 
rascal when he is sick ; meaning, I suppose, that he has no benevo- 
lent dispositions at that period towards his fellow-creatures, but 
that his notions assume a character of greater affinity to his bodily 
feelings, and that, feeling pain, he becomes malevolent ; and if this 
be true of great diseases, it is true in a less degree of the smaller 
ailments of the body. 

" Get up in a morning, walk before breakfast, pass four or five 
hours of the day in some active employment ; then eat and drink 
over-night, lie in bed till one or two o'clock, saunter away the 
rest of the day in doing nothing ! — can any two human beings be 
more perfectly dissimilar than the same individual under these two 
different systems of corporeal management ? and is it not of as 
great importance towards happiness to pay a minute attention to the 
body, as it is to study the wisdom of Chrysippus and Crantor V* 

" Of Occupation. 

"A good stout bodily machine being provided, we must be 
actively occupied, or there can be little happiness. 

a If a good useful occupation be not provided, it is so ungenial 
to the human mind to do nothing, that men occupy themselves 
perilously, as with gaming ; or frivolously, as with walking up and 
down a street at a watering-place, and looking at the passers-by ; 
or malevolently, as by teazing their wives and children. It is im- 
possible to support, for any length of time, a state of perfect enmii; 
and if you were to shut a man up for any length of time within 
four walls, without occupation, he would go mad. If idleness do 
not produce vice or malevolence, it commonly produces melancholy. 

" A stockbroker or a farmer have no leisure for imaginary wretch- 
edness ; their minds are usually hurried away by the necessity of 
noticing external objects, and they are guaranteed from that curse 
of idleness, the eternal disposition to think of themselves. 

" If we have no necessary occupation, it becomes extremely diffi- 
cult to make to ourselves occupations as entirely absorbing as those 
which necessity imposes. 

" The profession which a man makes for himself is seldom more 

G 



9 8 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

than a half profession, and often leaves the mind in a state oi 
vacancy and inoccupation. We must lash ourselves up however, 
as well as we can, to a notion of its great importance ; and as the 
dispensing power is in our own hands, we must be very jealous of 
remission and of idleness. 

" It may seem absurd that a gentleman who does not live by the 
profits of farming should rise at six o'clock in the morning to look 
after his farm ; or, if botany be his object, that he should voyage to 
Iceland in pursuit of it. He is the happier, however, for his eager- 
ness j his mind is more fully employed, and he is much more effec- 
tually guaranteed from all the miseries of ennui. 

" It is asked, if the object can be of such great importance ? 
Perhaps not ; but the pursuit is. The fox, when caught, is worth 
nothing : he is followed for the pleasure of the following. 

" What has a man to do with his life who has nothing which he 
must do ? It is admitted he must find some employment, but does 
it signify what that employment is ? Is he employed as much for 
his own happiness in cultivating a flower-garden as in philosophy, 
literature, or politics ? This must depend upon the individual him- 
self, and the circumstances in which he is placed. As far as th c 
mere occupation or exclusion of ennui goes , this can be settled only 
by the feelings of the person employed ; and if the attention be 
equally absorbed, in this point of view one occupation is as good 
as another ; but a man who is conscious he was capable of doing 
great things, and has occupied himself with trifles beneath the level 
of his understanding, is apt to feel envy at the lot of those who have 
excelled him, and remorse at the misapplications of his own powers ; 
he has not added to the pleasures of occupation the pleasures of 
benevolence, and so has not made his occupation as agreeable as 
he might have done, and he has probably not gained as much fame 
and wealth as he might have done if his pursuits had been of a higher 
nature. For these reasons it seems right that a man should attend 
to the highest pursuits in which he has any fair chance of excelling • 
he is as much occupied, gains more of what is worth gaining, and 
excludes remorse more effectually, even if he fail, because he is 
conscious of having made the effort. 

" When a very clever man, or a very great man, takes to culti- 
vating turnips and retiring, it is generally an imposture. The 
moment men cease to talk of their turnips, they are wretched and 
full of self-reproach. Let every man be occupied, and occupied in 
the highest employment of which his nature is capable, and die 
with the consciousness that he has done his best/" 

" Of Friendship. 
M Life is to be fortified by many friendships. To love, and to be 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



99 



loved, is the greatest happiness of existence. If I lived under the 
burning sun of the equator, it would be a pleasure to me to think 
that there were many human beings on the other side of the world 
who regarded and respected me ; I could and would not live if I 
were alone upon the earth, and cut off from the remembrance of my 
fellow-creatures. It is not that a man has occasion often to fall 
back upon the kindness of his friends ; perhaps he may never ex- 
perience the necessity of doing so ; but we are governed by our 
imaginations, and they stand there as a solid and impregnable bul- 
wark against all the evils of life. 

" Friendships should be formed with persons of all ages and con- 
ditions, and with both sexes. I have a friend who is a bookseller, 
to whom I have been very civil, and who would do anything to 
serve me ; and I have two or three small friendships among per- 
sons in much humbler walks of life, who, I verily believe, would do 
me a considerable kindness according to their means. It is a great 
happiness to form a sincere friendship with a woman ; but a friend- 
ship among persons of different sexes rarely or ever takes place in 
this country. The austerity of our manners hardly admits of such 
a connection j — compatible with the most perfect innocence, and a 
source of the highest possible delight to those who are fortunate 
enough to form it. 

" Very few friends will bear to be told of their faults ; and if done 
at all, it must be done with infinite management and delicacy ; for 
if you indulge often in this practice, men think you hate, and avoid 
you. If the evil is not very alarming, it is better indeed to let it 
alone, and not to turn friendship into a system of lawful and un- 
punishable impertinence. I am for frank explanations with friends 
in cases of affronts. They sometimes save a perishing friendship, 
and even place it on a firmer basis than at first ; but secret discon- 
tent must always end badly." 

" Of Cheerfulness. 

" Cheerfulness and good spirits depend in a great degree upon 
bodily causes, but much may be done for the promotion of this turn 
of mind. Persons subject to low spirits should make the rooms in 
which they live as cheerful as possible ; taking care that the paper 
with which the wall is covered should be of a brilliant, lively colour, 
hanging up pictures or prints, and covering the chimney-piece with 
beautiful china. A bay-window looking upon pleasant objects, 
and, above all, a large fire whenever the weather will permit, are 
favourable to good spirits, and the tables near should be strewed 
with books and pamphlets. To this must be added as much eat- 
ing and drinking as is consistent with health ; and some manual 
employment for men, — as gardening, a carpenter's shop, the turn- 



ioo MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

wig-lathe, &.c. Women have always manual employment enough, 
and it is a great source of cheerfulness. Fresh air, exercise, occu- 
pation, society, and travelling, are powerful remedies. 

" Melancholy commonly flies to the future for its aliment, and 
must be encountered in this sort of artifice, by diminishing the 
range of our views. I have a large family coming on, my income 
is diminishing, and I shall fall into pecuniary difficulties. Well ! 
but you are not now in pecuniary difficulties. Your eldest child is 
only seven years old ; it must be two or three years before your 
family make any additional demands upon your purse. Wait till 
the time comes. Much may happen in the interval to better your 
situation ; and if nothing does happen, at least enjoy the two or 
three years of ease and uninterruption which are before you. You 
are uneasy about your eldest son in India ; but it is now June, and 
at the earliest the fleet will not come in till September ; it may 
bring accounts of his health and prosperity, but at all events there 
are eight or nine weeks before you can hear news. Why are they 
to be spent as if you had heard the worst ? The habit of taking 
very short views of human life may be acquired by degrees, and a 
great sum of happiness is gained by it. It becomes as customary 
at last to view things on the good side of the question as it was 
before to despond, and to extract misery from every passing event. 

" A firm confidence in an overruling Providence, — a remem- 
brance of the shortness of human life, that it will soon be over and 
finished, — that we scarcely know, unless we could trace the remote 
consequences of every event, what would be good and what an 
evil ; — these are very important topics in that melancholy which 
proceeds from grief. 

" It is wise to state to friends that our spirits are low, to state the 
cause of the depression, and to hear all that argument or ridicule 
can suggest for the cure. Melancholy is always the worse for con- 
cealment, and many causes of depression are so frivolous, that we 
are shamed out of them by the mere statement of their existence." 

Scattered amongst his papers are a few fragments on metaphy- 
sical subjects, which always interested him. 

" Benevolence. 

" A child is born with the power of feeling bodily pleasure and 
pain. The milk he receives from his nurse delights him. The 
appearance of the nurse is always connected with that pleasure, 
and, by the laws of association, because he loves the milk he at last 
comes to love the nurse — that is, her presence excites in him the 
passion of joy. In the same manner, if his nurse, instead of suck- 
ling him, had rubbed his mouth with wormwood, the pain of the 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. roi 

wormwood would be united with the appearance of the nurse ; and 
because the taste of the wormwood excited in him the passion of 
sorrow, the appearance of the nurse would at last do the same. 
In this way we begin to connect our fellow-creatures with our 
pleasures and pains. 

" But whence comes it that a child travels from joy to benevo- 
lence, and wishes to do good to the person who excites in him 
pleasurable sensations ? Why is he not benevolent towards the 
pap-boat, or the nurse's gown, or any other inanimate object which 
his eye connects as frequently with his animal pleasures as the 
image of his nurse ? The progress from joy to benevolence is, I 
believe, entirely the result of experience, and the latter is a passion 
of much later growth than the other. As a child grows older, he 
perceives that the person who ministers to his joy and sorrow has 
similar feelings with himself, and that it becomes his interest to 
attend to them. If he scratches, and kicks, and cries, and knocks 
down glasses and tea-cups, he is shaken or scolded, or sugar is 
refused ; or he is put in the corner, or whipped. If he pleases his 
superior, come cakes, plums, toys, and amusing games. 

" In the same manner, at school, he is every day receiving 
lessons of the evils of malevolence and the advantages of benevo- 
lence. Kicks, cuffs, privations, solitude, deter him on one hand ; 
cheerful society, protection, community of joys, allure him on the 
other. In this way he learns the important lesson of doing good in 
order to promote his own good ; and having loved the passion for 
its utility, he loves it at last for himself. In after-life, the poet, the 
orator, the moralist, and the preacher, praise and purify this fine 
passion, give it strength, which conceals its origin, and makes it 
appear primary and original. 

" In order to make this more clear, let us suppose that a child 
was treated, to a late period, with the same uniform indulgence, 
however numerous his faults, and however untoward his dis- 
position ; that nurse, father, mother, school-fellow, and school- 
master, all studied his humours and ministered to his wants, 
without exacting from him in return the slightest attention to their 
own feelings. What motive could such a child have for benevo- 
lence ? How would he learn to become benevolent ? Why should 
he cultivate such passive human beings, more than the spoon, or 
the silver mug, which, tossed and tumbled about by his caprice 
to-day, are sure to appear at the dinner of to-morrow ? 

'•' In fact, such a blind submission to the will of any child would 
infallibly make him a tyrant, and extinguish in his mind every 
spark of benevolence : but if an exemption from the necessity of 
attending to the feelings of our fellow-creatures, destroys benevo- 
lence, the necessity of doing so may be presumed to teach it. 



102 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Where one fact, admitted to be true, will explain other facts 
equally admitted to be true, there is no occasion to suppose other 
facts which are doubtful, in order to make a new series of causes 
and consequences. That children are born capable of feeling 
bodily pain and pleasure, is not disputed ; that they soon learn to 
be benevolent towards, or to love their fellow-creatures, is an 
equally admitted fact. If one of these facts can be shown to be 
the cause of the other, there is no occasion to have recourse to a 
principle of benevolence as an original principle of our nature ; 
but this, though a curious, is not a very important question. 
Whether innate, or early learnt, the most pure and disinterested 
benevolence exists in human nature. Howard visited prisons and 
lazarettos, and sacrificed his life for his fellow-creatures, let the 
metaphysical origin of benevolence be what it may. 

"The passion of benevolence, thus excited in our nature, 
receives the name of gratitude, when we desire to do good to those 
who have done good to us. From apparent gratitude, is to be 
deducted the hope of future favour from the object of our gratitude, 
and the dread of infamy for being ungrateful. The pure passion 
may be explained from the united effects of association and educa- 
tion. Sexual love is that benevolence to persons of the opposite 
sex, which proceeds from the beauty of their countenance or their 
form. 

" Paternal love is the benevolence which a father feels towards 
his child. This passion, like all others which are of use to man- 
kind, is very much increased by education and general opinion, by 
reason and reflection, and by compassion, by habit, and associ- 
ation. I see no occasion for supposing the existence of any 
original principle of paternal love. The analogy from animals is 
entirely against it. Love, when applied to persons of the same 
sex, affection, and kindness, are all modifications of the same 
passions of joy, or benevolence ; an agreeable, charming, or 
delightful person excites these passions in us, in different degrees, 
gives us feelings of joy, or makes us desirous of doing him some 
good. When benevolence excites us to give, it is called generosity. 
Hope is the belief, more or less strong, that joy will come ; desire 
is the wish it may come. There is no word to designate the 
remembrance of joys past." 

" Of the Mind. {A Fragment) 

" The mind is inhabited by ideas, by passions, and by desires. 
Passions are strong feelings or affections of the mind, not leading 
immediately to action. Desires are strong feelings of the mind, 
accompanied by a wish to act. 

" In revenge, I can perceive that my mind is powerfully affected, 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

and I have a wish to act, and to give pain to some person : this is 
a desire. When the possession of sudden wealth is announced to 
me, I feel transported with joy, but I have no immediate desire to 
act ; here I only recognize the affection of my mind. 

" In avarice, there is the feeling and the wish to act, — this is a 
desire. In grief there is only the affection or perturbation of the 
mind, — this is a passion. Every desire is a passion : every passion 
is not a desire. Emotion is another name for passion. 

" The mind is of course the seat of all pain and pleasure. The 
pain of the gout is not in my toe, but in my mind, and I refer it to 
the toe as the cause. If this were otherwise, I should have ten 
minds instead of one, and as many on my hands. 

"The pains and pleasures of the body ought to be classed 
among the passions. They are passions to all intents and 
purposes. The pains of the body have all some affinity to each 
other, and in consequence of that affinity have received the 
common name of pain. They are not degrees of the same feeling, 
but are different feelings, though with some general resemblance. 
It is an abuse of terms to call the pain excited by gout, by a cut, 
by a contusion, and by the stomach-ache, degrees of the same 
feeling. In the same manner, the pleasures arising from sweetness, 
smoothness, or from savoury tastes, appear to be distinct feelings, 
with some common relation between them, and therefore denom- 
inated pleasures. 

" What is true of pain and of pleasure referred to the body, and 
in popular estimation supposed to exist in the body, is true also of 
the pains and pleasures of the mind. 

" Grief, hatred, and revenge, are not degrees of the same painful 
feeling, but distinct feelings. So are hope, joy, and benevolence ; 
but all the agreeable passions have some resemblance to each other, 
so have all the disagreeable passions." 

I find among his papers various hints for history, such as the 
following, many of which are very characteristic. 

" In 1758, the Chevalier Barras was burnt to death at Amiens 
for singing a blasphemous song. Thirty-five years afterwards the 
Christian religion was abolished all over France, and the church 
property confiscated. 

" Blackstone says that for the Bull Unigenitus alone fifty-four 
thousand lettres de cachet were issued. Seventy thousand persons 
executed in the reign of Henry VIII. {See Brodie, vol. i.) 

" In 1782, Louis XVI., exercising the right of issuing lettres de 
cachet, and in possession of full and unrestrained power ; ten years 
after, his head was cut off. 



104 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" In 1770, the English Legislature taxed the American colonies, 
and made laws for them ; in twelve years afterwards the colonies 
were declared an independent State. 

"In 1797, Ireland petitioned the English Parliament for some 
small indulgence to their commerce : the petition was unanimously 
ignored : in eight years afterwards, Ireland was unanimously de- 
clared by the same Parliament to be a separate and independent 
kingdom. 

" In America there is no waste of public money ; all public 
matters are conducted with exemplary frugality. On days of cere- 
mony, two constables walk before the President, and he sits down 
to a joint of meat and a pudding provided at the expense of twenty- 
two republics. 

" The religious mistakes of mankind have been, that there are 
spirits mingling with mankind, hence demons, witchcraft ; that God 
governs the world by present judgments, hence ordeals ; that there 
is a connection between the fate of particular men and the heavenly 
bodies at the time of their birth, hence astrology ; that God is to be 
worshipped by the misery and privations of the worshippers, hence 
monasteries a?id flagellations. 

"Account of Taxes from William the Conqueror. 



1066 


. ,£200,000 


1566 . 


. ;£ I, 500,000 


1266 


. 1 50,000 


1666 . 


. I,800,000 


1366 . 


130,000 


1766 . 


. 1 7,000,000 


1466 


100,000 







" Four years after the Scotch Union, Lord F moved its repeal 

in the House of Lords, 54 against 54 ; four proxies carried it against 
the motion. 

" Fleury became minister at seventy-three years of age. 

" Galileo was made to promise, on his knees, never to teach 
again the motion of the Earth and the Sun ; as a part of his 
punishment, he was directed to write every week the seven Peni- 
tential Psalms. 

" The infamous Judge Jeffreys would not give up his Protestant- 
ism, and lost the favour of James II. 

" At the Revolution, the debt was a million, the revenue two, i.e., 
we owed half a year's income — at present about sixteen years' in- 
come. 

" Brahmins may eat beef, if killed for sacrifice, — and there are 
sacrifices every day. 

" The Excise and Post Office began under the Commonwealth. 
Court of Wards abolished in the Commonwealth. 

" Colbert never taxed imports as high as ten per cent, ad valorem; 
he had no prohibition. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 105 

" The Scotch members used to receive ten guineas per week, 
secret service money. 

" Sir John Trevor, Speaker of the Lower House, was convicted 
of receiving a bribe of a thousand pounds from the City of London 
between 1700 and 17 16." 

Amongst his manuscripts is a sketch he wrote at a later period, 
giving an account of English misrule in Ireland from the earliest 
period of our possession up to the present day, compiled from the 
best existing documents, and forming so fearful a picture that he 
hesitated to give it to the world when done. After his death, my 
mother, thinking that the time had perhaps arrived when it might 
be published, referred to a gentleman whom she justly felt to be 
one of the highest historical authorities of our day, and received 
from Mr Macaulay the following answer : — 

"1847. 
" Dear Mrs Sydney Smith, 

" I am truly grateful to you for suffering me to see the sketch of 
Irish history, drawn up by my admirable and excellent friend. 1 
perfectly understand the generous feeling with which it was written, 
and I also think that I see why it was never published. While the 
Catholic disabilities lasted, he whom we regret did all that he could 
to awaken the conscience of the oppressors and to find excuses for 
the faults of the oppressed. When these disabilities had been re- 
moved, and when designing men still attempted to inflame the Irish 
against England, by repeating tales of grievances which had passed 
away, he felt that this work would no longer do any good, and that 
it might be used by demagogues in such a way as to do positive 
harm. You will see, from what I have said, that though I think this 
piece honourable to his memory, I do not wish to see it published, 
nor do I think that, though it would raise the reputation of almost 
any other writer of our time, it would raise his ; in truth, nothing 
that is not of very rare and striking merit ought now to be given 
to the world under his name. He is universally admitted to have 
been a great reasoner, and the greatest master of ridicule that has 
appeared among us since Swift. * Many things, therefore, which, 

* I find my father here, and indeed in almost every sketch of him, compared to Swift 
in the character of his writings. It is for others to decide upon the justness of the com- 
parison ; but there is one difference I ought, and I am proud to point out, that there is 
not a single line in them that might not be placed before the purity of youth, or that is 
unfit for the eye of a woman ; that he has exercise' 1 his powers of wit and sarcasm to the 
utmost, without ever sullying his pages with impurfties, or degrading his talents and pro- 
fession by irreligion ; and this, I believe, can in very few instances be asserted of any 
other eminently humorous writer, either French or English, who have used such powers 
to any great extent. Lord John Russell, in writing to me of my father, says on this 
subject: — " Too much indulgence has been shown to the extravagance, dishonesty, and 
domestic infidelity of men of wit, as if the ' light that led astray was light from heaven.' 
It is not light from heaven, but flashes from a volcano which has its seat in hell." 



io6 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

if they came from an inferior author, would be read with pleasure, 
will produce disappointment if published as works of Mr Sydney 
Smith. I return the papers with most sincere thanks. Believe me 
ever, dear Mrs Sydney Smith, yours very truly, 

"T. B. Macaulay." 

My father had not long been established in his house at Hesling- 
ton before several of his old friends found him out ; among the first 
of these were Mr Horner, Mr Murray, and Mr Adams. In August 
Mr Abercromby and his family spent a few days with him, which 
gave him much pleasure ; and he had also a visit from Lord Webb 
Seymour, one of the friends with whom he had lived most intimately 
at Edinburgh, and whose early death was a source of deep regret 
to him. To the latter be dedicated a small volume of sermons 
which he had preached during hie residence there, in the following 
words : — " My Lord, — I dedicate these few sermons to you as a 
slight token of my great regard and respect ; because I know no 
man who, in spite of the disadvantages of high birth, lives to more 
honourable and commendable purposes than yourself." 

When my father settled in the country, he formed the resolution 
never to shoot ; " first," he says, " because I found, on trying at 
Lord Grey's that the birds seemed to consider the muzzle of my gun 
as their safest position ; secondly, because I never could help 
shutting my eyes when I fired my gun, so was not likely to im- 
prove ; and thirdly, because, if you do shoot, the squire and the 
poacher both consider you as their natural enemy, and I thought it 
more clerical to be at peace with both." 

In 1810 my father had the pleasure of receiving his old and 
valued friend, Sir Samuel Romilly, and his family ; and so deep 
was his veneration for the unbending virtue of this great man, that 
the meeting was one not easily forgotten. No two men were ever 
more unlike, or pursued the same ends by such different paths ; yet 
they had many feelings in common, and a total absence of all those 
littlenesses which sometimes obscure and alienate even great men. 
I remember Sir Samuel went with my father to see Castle Howard, 
at which he gazed with great admiration, and after a long pause, 
standing on the steps of the portico and looking towards the mau- 
soleum and at the lovely landscape around, he exclaimed, spreading 
out his arms, " These are indeed things that must make death 
terrible !" 

Some years after, my father introduced the following passage, 
on the recent death of Sir Samuel Romilly, into a sermon on the 
subject of Meditation on Death. As it has not been published, 
I shall insert it here, as a proof of his feelings towards that eminent 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 107 

" And let me ask you, my brethern, we who see the good and 
great daily perishing before our eyes, what comfort have we but 
this hope in Christ that we shall meet again ? Remember the em- 
inent men who, within the few years last past, have paid the great 
debt of nature. The earth stripped of its moral grandeur, sunk in 
its spiritual pride. The melancholy wreck of talents and of wisdom 
gone, my brethren, when we feel how dear, how valuable they were 
to us, when we would have asked of God on our bended knees their 
preservation and their life. Can we live with all that is excellent 
in human nature, can we study it, can we contemplate it, and then 
lose it and never hope to see it again ? 

" Can we say of any human being, as we may say of that great 
man who was torn from us in the beginning of this winter, that he 
acted with vast capacity upon all the great calamities of life ; that 
he came with unblemished purity to restrain iniquity ; that, con- 
demning injustice, he was just : that, restraining corruption, he was 
pure ; that those who were provoked to look into the life of a great 
statesman, found him a good man also, and acknowledged he was 
sincere even when they did not believe he was right ? Can we say 
of such a man, with all the career of worldly ambition before him, 
that he was the friend of the wretched and the poor ; that in the 
midst of vast occupation he remembered the debtor's cell, the 
prisoner's dungeon, the last hour of the law's victim ; that he medi- 
tated day and night on wretchedness, weakness, and want ? Can 
we say all this of any human being, and then have him no more in 
remembrance ? When you ' die daily,' my brethren ; when you 
remember my text, paint to yourselves the gathering together again 
of the good and the just. 

" Remember that God is to be worshipped, that death is to be met 
by such a life as this ; remember, in the last hour, that rank, that 
birth, that wealth, that all earthly things will vanish away, that 
you will then think only of the wretchedness you have lessened 
and the good you have done." 

I see, by letters in my possession, that on the publication of Sir 
Samuel Romilly's Life by his sons, my father's letter of warm ad- 
miration was the first received by the family ; and the terms in 
which they speak of the value of my father's praise is highly grati- 
fying to those who love his memory. 

My father had by this time made a considerable acquaintance in 
and round York. Dining out on one occasion, he happened to meet 

Mr , whom he always met with pleasure, as he was a man of 

sense, simplicity, and learning ; but with such a total absence, not 
only of humour in himself, but of perception of it in others, as made 
him an amusing subject of speculation to my father. 



108 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

The conversation at dinner took a liberal turn. My father, in the 
full career of his spirits, happened to say, " Though he was not 
generally considered an illiberal man, yet he must confess he had 
one little weakness, one secret wish, — he should like to roast a 

Quaker:' "Good heavens, Mr Smith!" said Mr- , full of 

horror, " roast a Quaker ?" " Yes, Sir " (with the greatest gravity), 
" roast a Quaker ! " " But do you consider, Mr Smith, the tor- 
ture ?" " Yes, Sir," said my father, " I have considered everything. 
It may be wrong, as you say : the Quaker would undoubtedly 
suffer acutely, but every one has his tastes — mine would be to roast 
a Quaker : one would satisfy me, only one. It is one of those 
peculiarities I have striven against in vain, and I hope you will 
pardon my weakness." 

Mr 's honest simplicity could stand this no longer, and he 

seemed hardly able to sit at table with him. The whole company 
were in roars of laughter at the scene : but neither this, nor the 
mirth and mischief sparkling in my father's eye, enlightened him in 
the least, for a joke was a thing of which he had no conception. 
At last my father, seeing that he was giving real pain, said, " Come, 

come, Mr , since you think this so very illiberal, I must be 

wrong ; and will give up my roasted Quaker rather than your 
esteem ; let us drink wine together." Peace was made, but I be- 
lieve neither time nor explanation would have ever made him com- 
prehend it was a joke. 

Though it was the general habit in Yorkshire to make visits of 
two or three days at the houses in the neighbourhood, yet not un- 
frequently invitations to dinner only came, and sometimes to a 
house at a considerable distance. 

" Did you ever dine out in the country ?" said my father. 
" What misery human beings inflict on each other under the name 

of pleasure ! We went to dine last Thursday with Mr -, a 

neighbouring clergyman, a haunch of venison being the stimulus 
to the invitation. We set out at five o'clock ; drove in a broiling 
sun, on dusty roads, three miles, in our best gowns ; found Squire 
and parsons assembled in a small hot room, the whole house 
redolent of frying ; talked, as is our wont, of roads, weather, and 
turnips ; that done, began to grow hungry, then serious, then im- 
patient. At last a stripling, evidently caught up for the occasion, 
opened the door and beckoned our host out of the room. After 
some moments of awful suspense, he returned to us with a face of 
much distress, saying, 'the woman assisting in the kitchen had 
mistaken the soup for dirty water, and had thrown it away, so we 
must do without it ;' we all agreed it was perhaps as well we should, 
under the circumstances. At last, to our joy, dinner was announced; 
but oh, ye gods ! as we entered the dining-room what a gale met 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 109 

our nose ! the venison was high ; the venison was uneatable, and 
was obliged to follow the soup with all speed. 

" Dinner proceeded, but our spirits flagged under these accumu- 
lated misfortunes. There was an ominous pause between the first 
and second course ; we looked each other in the face — what new 
disaster awaited us ? The pause became fearful. At last the door 
burst open, and the boy rushed in, calling out aloud, ' Please, Sir, 
has Betty any right to leather I ?' What human gravity could 
stand this ? We roared with laughter; all took part against Betty, 
obtained the second course with some difficulty, bored each other 
the usual time, ordered our carriages, expecting our post-boys to be 
drunk, and were grateful to Providence for not permitting them to 
deposit us in a wet ditch. So much for dinners in the country ! " 

This winter he received another visit from his friend Jeffrey, who 
came with an American gentleman, Mr Simond, and his niece, 
Miss Wilkes. We little suspected then that this lady, great-niece 
to the agitator Wilkes, was so soon after to become Mrs Jeffrey. 
We had visits also from Mr Horner, Mr Murray, and Lord Lauder- 
dale. My father used to say of Mr Horner that he had the Ten 
Commandments written on his face ; in fact, that he looked so 
virtuous, that he might commit any crime, and no one would 
believe in the possibility of his guilt. 

It was, I believe, in 181 2 that my father's eldest brother, Robert, 
who had gone out to India as Advocate- General of Bengal, eight 
years before, returned with his wife and family to this country,— a 
return we had all been eagerly looking forward to. Before leaving 
India, my uncle had with great generosity offered to remain there 
another year, and to bestow the proceeds of his office upon my 
father : but the latter, poor as he was, fearing the effects of the 
climate, and knowing his brother's ardent desire to return to Eng- 
land, with equal generosity refused, without a moment's hesitation, 
to accept such a sacrifice. We went to their house in town to meet 
them, and spent some weeks there. 

My father was received with open arms by all his old friends in 
London ; and the pleasure and interest of this visit to his old haunts 
were much enhanced by the arrival of his friend Sir James Mac- 
kintosh likewise from India, after an absence from England of 
about the same time. He arrived on the eve of a general election, 
and during the excitement of political changes consequent upon the 
murder of Mr Perceval, and the attempt to form a ministry under 
Lord Wellesley. In the summer Sir James went with Lady Mac- 
kintosh to the Highlands, and on their return spent some days with 
my father at Heslington. 

In the autumn of the following year, Madame de Stael, driven 
from Copet by the persecutions of Napoleon, took refuge in Eng- 



no MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

land, and was an object of general interest and attention. She was 
constantly in the society of Sir James Mackintosh ; and having 
heard much of my father, and of his powers of conversation and 
argument, she was eager to make his acquaintance, and try her 
eloquence upon him. She used frequently to say to Sir James, 
with the odd jumble she made of English titles and names, " Mais, 
votre ami Sydney Smith, ce Pretre-Amiral, pourquoi ne vient-il 
pas ?" 

The Pretre-Amiral was unable to leave his parish during her visit 
here, so they never met. Some years after, at Nice, she made the 
acquaintance of his elder brother Robert, whose wonderful powers 
of argument and exquisite French she revelled in through a whole 
winter ; though often defeated by him in discussions, to the delight 
of all the English staying there, whom she had bullied terribly 
before his arrival, and who looked up to him as a sort of champion. 
" Ah ! pourquoi ne parlez-vous pas comme 5a dans la Chambre des 
Communes ?" said Madame de Stael to him one day, after listening 
for some time to the eloquent flow of his language. Mr Canning 
used to say, " Bobus's language is the essence of English." Sir 
James Mackintosh, speaking of him in India, says, " I hear fre- 
quently of Bobus ; his name amongst the natives is greater than that 
of any pundit since the days of Menu." 

The following year my uncle came down with his family to visit 
us in Yorkshire, and remained with us a month. On his return to 
Northampton a typhus fever attacked, with most fearful and fatal 
results, first his family, then the nurse, and lastly himself. My aunt, 
in communicating these dreadful tidings, entreated my father to 
come to their aid ; and, after taking medical advice as to the best 
precautions against infection, he set off, without a moment's hesita- 
tion, and in spite of my mother's earnest entreaties. 

An intimate friend, who was staying with us at the time, and was 
present at this scene, tells me, " Nothing in my long knowledge of him 
ever gave me a higher idea of your father's generosity of character 
and firmness of principle than this act ; for, in addition to his know- 
ledge how dependent you all were upon him, and that your mother 
was near her confinement, he went, not ignorant of, or despising, 
the danger, but with his eyes open to it, fearing it very much, and 
fully believing he was going to meet death. But in spite of his own 
fears and your poor mother's efforts, he resisted, and said, 'If any 
evil were to happen to Bobus, I should reproach myself all my life ; 
but,' added he, ' Kate, mind, if I do die, you must always keep the 
day of my death.' " 

My father remained with my uncle some weeks, until he had the 
satisfaction of leaving him convalescent, and comfortably established 
in a house near Northampton, under the care of the most eminent 



MEMOIR OF THE RE V. S YDNE Y SMITH. 1 1 1 

physician there, the late Dr Carr, uncle to Lady Davy. He re- 
turned in safety to my poor mother, whose anxiety during this period 
may easily be imagined. 

Amongst our rural delights at Heslington was the possession of 
a young donkey, which had been given up to our tender mercies 
from its birth, and in whose education we employed a large portion 
of our spare time ; and a most accomplished donkey it became 
under our tuition. It would walk up-stairs, pick pockets, follow us 
in our walks like a huge Newfoundland dog, and at the most distant 
sight of us in the field, with ears down and tail erect, would set off 
in full bray to meet us. These demonstrations on Bitty's part were 
met with not less affection on ours, and Bitty was almost considered 
a member of the family. 

One day, when my elder brother and myself were training our 
beloved Bitty, with a pocket-handkerchief for a bridle, and his head 
crowned with flowers, to run round our garden, who should arrive 
in the midst of our sport but Mr Jeffrey. Finding that my father 
was out, he, with his usual kindness towards young people, im- 
mediately joined in our sport, and, to our infinite delight, mounted 
our donkey. He was proceeding in triumph, amidst our shouts of 
laughter, when my father and mother, in company, I believe, with 
Mr Horner and Mr Murray, returned from their walk, and beheld 
this scene from the garden door. Though years and years have 
passed away, I still remember the joy-inspiring laughter that burst 
from my father at this unexpected sight, as advancing towards his 
old friend, with a face beaming with delight and with extended 
arms, he broke forth in the following impromptu : — 

" Witty as Horatius Flaccus, 
As great a Jacobin as. Gracchus, 
Short, though not as fat, as Bacchus, 
Riding on a little jackass." 

These lines were afterwards repeated by some one to Mr at 

Holland House, just before he was introduced for the first time to 
Mr Jeffrey ; and they caught his fancy to such a degree, that he 
could not get them out of his head, but kept repeating them in 
a low voice all the time Mr Jeffrey was conversing with him. 

I must end Bitty's history, as he has been introduced, by saying 
that he followed us to Foston, served us faithfully fcr thirteen years, 
and, on our leaving Yorkshire, was permitted by our kind friend 
Lord Carlisle to spend the rest of his days in idleness and 
plenty, in his beautiful park, with an unbounded command of 
thistles. 

My father meanwhile had entered into negotiations with various 
clergymen to effect an exchange of livings, but the conditions im- 



H2 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

posed by Lord Eldon had hitherto prevented them from being 
brought to a successful conclusion. He continued, therefore, to 
drive over every week to do duty at his living. 

One Sunday (to show the very primitive state of the villagers), 
just as he was about to enter the church, the clerk, the sexton, the 
churchwardens, and the principal farmers came rushing after him, 
exclaiming with agitated countenances, " Please your honour, a 
coach ! a coach !" My father, with a calmness that filled them 
with wonder, said, " Well, well, my good friends, stand firm, never 
mind ; even though there should be a coach, it will do us no harm ; 
let us see." And certainly a carriage was seen approaching, such 
as rarely appeared in those parts ; and as it advanced rapidly 
towards the little miserable hovel which had once been the parson- 
age-house, it was discovered to contain a very fashionable lady. 
The lady turned out to be Mrs Apreece, on her way from Scot- 
land, bringing letters of introduction to my father, whom she was 
anxious to hear preach ; and this was the beginning of an acquaint- 
ance which afterwards ripened into intimacy, and several of the 
most amusing of his letters are addressed to her, under her more 
celebrated name of Lady Davy. She and Sir Humphry in after- 
times not unfrequently put up at the Rector's Head, as my father 
used to call his house ; and certainly no landlord could rejoice 
more in " a run on the road," or more cordially welcome the sight 
of an old friend, 



CHAPTER VII. 

iJuilds House — Removes to Foston — Visit of Sir James Mackintosh — Bee mes a 
Magistrate — Visit to Newgate with Mrs Fry, and Sermon — Visit to Sir G. Philips 
— Forms the Acquaintance of the Earl of Carlisle — Death of only Sister — Last Visit 
from Mr Horner — Bad Harvest, and Fever — Exertions amongst the Poor — Visit 
from Lord and Lady Holland — Leaves off Riding — Callamity — Shopping — Sends 
Son to School — Visits Lord Grey — Visit from Dr Marcet — Conversation — Bunch 

— Inscription for Duke of Bedford's Statue — Anecdote of Lord 's Son — Assizes 

—Hunt's Trial— Death of Grattan. 

Thus cheered by occasional visits of his friends, turning his back 
upon London and former habits, he contrived by the aid of books 
and of the various new duties and interests he had created for him- 
self, to pass three years not unpleasantly nor unprofitably. Not 
having succeeded in exchanging his living, he, according to his 
promise to the archbishop, set vigorously to work to build his 
house ; and accomplished it in nine months after laying the first 
stone. But he shall here tell his own tale, as I have heard it at 
various times in detached portions. 

" A diner-out, a wit, and a popular preacher, I was suddenly 
caught up by the Archbishop of York, and transported to my living 
in Yorkshire, where there had not been a resident clergyman for a 
hundred and fifty years. Fresh from London, not knowing a turnip 
from a carrot, I was compelled to farm three hundred acres, and 
without capital to build a parsonage-house. 

" I asked and obtained three years' leave from the Archbishop, in 
order to effect an exchange, if possible ; and fixed myself meantime 
at a small village two miles from York, in which was a fine old 
house of the time of Queen Elizabeth, where resided the last of the 
squires, with his lady, who looked as if she had walked straight out 
of the Ark, or had been the wife of Enoch. He was a perfect speci- 
men of the Trullibers of old ; he smoked, hunted, drank beer at his 
door with his grooms and dogs, and spelt over the county paper on 
Sundays. 

" At first he heard that I was a Jacobin and a dangerous fellow, 
and turned aside as I passed ; but at length, when he found the 
peace of the village undisturbed, harvests much as usual, Juno and 
Ponto uninjured, he first bowed, then called, and at last reached 
such a pitch of confidence that he used to bring the papers, that I 
might explain the difficult words to him ; actually discovered that 

H 



H4 MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 

I had made a joke, laughed till I thought he would have died of 
convulsions, and ended by inviting me to see his dogs. 

"All my efforts for an exchange having failed, I asked and ob- 
tained from my friend the Archbishop another year to build in. 
And I then set my shoulder to the wheel in good earnest ; sent for 
an architect ; he produced plans which would have ruined me. I 
made him my bow : ' You build for glory, Sir ; I, for use." I re- 
turned him his plans, with five-and-twenty pounds, and sat down in 
my thinking-chair ; and in a few hours Mrs Sydney and I concocted 
a plan which has produced what I call the model of parsonage-houses. 

" I then took to horse to provide bricks and timber ; was advised 
to make my own bricks of my own clay ; of course, when the kiln 
was opened, all bad ; mounted my horse again, and in twenty-four 
hours had bought thousands of bricks and tons of timber. Was 
advised by neighbouring gentlemen to employ oxen : bought four, 
— Tug and Lug, Haul and Crawl ; but Tug and Lug took to faint- 
ing, and required buckets of sal-volatile, and Haul and Crawl to lie 
down in the mud. So I did as I ought to have done at first,— took 
the advice of the farmer instead of the gentleman ; sold my oxen, 
bought a team of horses, and at last, in spite of a frost which de- 
layed me six weeks, in spite of walls running down with wet, in 
spite of the advice and remonstrances of friends who predicted our 
death, in spite of an infant of six months old, who had never been 
out of the house, 1 landed my family in my new house nine months 
after laying the first stone, on the 20th of March ; and performed 
my promise to the letter to the Archbishop, by issuing forth at mid- 
night with a lantern to meet the last cart, with the cook and the 
cat, which had stuck in the mud, and fairly established them before 
twelve o'clock at night in the new parsonage-house ; — a feat, taking 
ignorance, inexperience, and poverty into consideration, requiring, 
I assure you, no small degree of energy. 

" It made me a very poor man for many years, but I never 
repented it. I turned schoolmaster, to educate my son, as I could 
not afford to send him to school. Mrs Sydney turned school- 
mistress, to educate my girls, as I could not afford a governess. I 
turned farmer, as I could not let my land. A man-servant was too 
expensive ; so I caught up a little garden-girl, made like a mile- 
stone, christened her Bunch, put a napkin in her hand, and made 
her my butler. The girls taught her to read, Mrs Sydney to wait, 
and I undertook her morals ; Bunch became the best butler in the 
county. 

" I had little furniture, so I bought a cart-load of deals ; took a 
carpenter (who came to me for parish relief), called Jack Robinson, 
with a face like a full-moon, into my service ; established him in a 
barn, and said, ' Jack, furnish my house. 7 You see the result ! 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 115 

" At last it was suggested that a carriage was much wanted in 
the establishment. After diligent search, I discovered in the back 
settlements of a York coachmaker an ancient green chariot, sup- 
posed to have been the earliest invention of the kind. I brought 
it home in triumph to my admiring family. Being somewhat 
dilapidated, the village tailor lined it, the village blacksmith 
repaired it ; nay, but for Mrs Sydney's earnest entreaties we 
believe the village painter would have exercised his genius upon 
the exterior ; it escaped this danger, however, and the result was 
wonderful. Each year added to its charms : it grew younger and 
younger ; a new wheel, a new spring ; I christened it the Immortal 
It was known all over the neighbourhood ; the village boys cheered 
it, and the village dogs barked at it ; but ' Faber meae fortunae ' 
was my motto, and we had no false shame. 

" Added to all these domestic cares, I was village parson, village 
doctor, village comforter, village magistrate, and Edinburgh Re- 
viewer ; so you see I had not much time left on my hands to regret 
London. 

" My house was considered the ugliest in the county, but all ad- 
mitted it was one of the most comfortable ; and we did not die, as 
our friends had predicted, of the damp walls of the parsonage." 

This year (18 13) was one of great exertion and anxiety to him, 
both in body and mind. He calculated that in the course of it he 
must have ridden several times round the world, in going back- 
wards and forwards from Heslington to his living, as the offices of 
architect, superintendent of the works, farmer, clergyman, school- 
master, were all centred in his person ; while, to add to his 
anxieties and responsibilities, in September of this year another 
son Avas born to him. 

Soon after engaging on the building of his house, the Arch- 
bishop, who, through the kind intervention of Mr Harcourt and 
other friends, had been made more fully aware of the difficulties of 
my father's situation, most unexpectedly sent him formal permis- 
sion to avoid building. Mr Allen and my father's kind friends at 
Holland House, on hearing of this, sent him many letters of remon- 
strance ; for they had always hoped that some exchange might 
turn up, to restore him again to the south ; and indeed were con- 
stantly making exertions to accomplish this object. They were 
most unwilling that he should embark in an undertaking which 
they knew would hamper him for many years to come. But my 
father felt it to be his duty to himself, to his parish, and to the 
Archbishop, whose indulgence it would be base to abuse. Being 
thoroughly convinced of this, he persevered in what he felt to be 
right, in spite of the strong temptation to do otherwise ; though 
the necessity of erecting farm-buildings, as well as a house, ab- 



n6 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

sorbed not only all his available capital, but left him with a heavy 
debt besides. 

At last, however, the deed was done, and I well remember the 
landing at Foston, March 1814. Indeed, how should I forget it? 
A day of such difficulty, discomfort, bustle, and delight, seldom 
occurs twice in one life. 

It was a cold, bright March day, with a biting east wind. The 
beds we left in the morning had to be packed up and slept on at 
night. Waggon after waggon of furniture poured in every minute ; 
the roads were so cut up that the carriage could not reach the 
door ; and my mother lost her shoe in the mud, which was ankle- 
deep, whilst bringing her infant up to the house in her arms. 

But oh, the shout of joy as we entered and took possession ! It 
was the first time in our lives that we had inhabited a house of 
our own. How we admired it, ugly as it was ! With what pride 
my dear father welcomed us, and took us from room to room ; 
old Molly Mills, the milk-woman, who had had charge of the 
house, grinning with delight in the background. We thought it a 
palace ; yet the drawing-room had no door, the bare plaster walls 
ran down with wet, the windows were like ground glass from the 
moisture which had to be wiped up several times a day by the 
housemaid. No carpets, no chairs, nothing unpacked ; rough men 
bringing in rougher packages at every moment. But then was the 
time to behold my father ! Amid the confusion, he thought for 
everybody, cared for everybody, encouraged everybody, kept every- 
body in good humour. How he exerted himself ! how his loud, 
rich voice might be heard in all directions, ordering, arranging, 
explaining, till the household storm gradually subsided ! Each 
half-hour improved our condition ; fires blazed in every room. At 
last we all sat down to tea, spread by ourselves on a huge package 
before the drawing-room fire, sitting on boxes round it ; and retired 
to sleep on beds placed upon the floor ; — the happiest, merriest, 
and busiest family in Christendom. In a few days, through my 
father's active exertions, everything was arranged with tolerable 
comfort in the little household, and it began to assume a settled 
appearance. 

In speaking of the establishment at Foston, Annie Kay must 
not be 'brgotten. She entered our service at nineteen years of age, 
but possessed a degree of sense and lady-like feeling not often 
found in her situation of life ; and she officiated first as nurse, then 
as lady's-maid, afterwards as housekeeper, apothecary's boy, 
factotum, and friend. All who have been much at Foston or 
Combe Florey knew Annie Kay. She was called into consult- 
ation on every family event, and proved herself a worthy oracle ; 
Jier counsels were delivered in the softest voice, with the sweetest 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. u 7 

smile, and in the broadest Yorkshire. She ended by nursing her 
old master through his long and painful illness, night and day. 
She was with him at his death ; she followed him to his grave ; 
she was remembered in his will ; she survived him but two years, 
which she spent in my mother's house ; and, after a long and 
faithful service of thirty years, was buried by my mother in the 
same cemetery as her master, respected and lamented by all his 
family, as the most faithful of servants and friends. 

So much for the interior of the establishment. Out-of-doors 
reigned Molly Mills, the cow, pig, poultry, garden, and post 
woman ; with her short red petticoat, legs like millposts, high 
cheek-bones red and shrivelled like winter apples ; a perfect 
specimen of a "yeowoman;" a sort of kindred spirit too, for she 
was the wit of the village, and delighted in a crack with her 
master, when she could get it. She was as important in her 
vocation as Annie Kay in hers ; and Molly here, and Molly there, 
might be heard in every direction. Molly was always merry, 
willing, active, and true as gold. She had little book-learning, 
but sense enough to bring up two fine athletic sons, as honest as 
herself; though, unlike her, they were never seen to smile, but 
were as solemn as two owls, and would not have said a civil thing 
to save their lives. They ruled the farm. Add to these, the pet 
donkey, Bitty, already introduced to the public ; a tame fawn, at 
last dismissed for eating the maid's clothes, which it preferred to 
any other diet ; a lame goose, condemned at last to be roasted for 
eating all the fruit in the garden ; together with Bunch and Jack 
Robinson, already mentioned, — and you have the establishment. 

As magistrates were much wanted in our neighbourhood, my 
father had now, in addition to his numerous avocations, taken upon 
himself the duties of a Justice of the Peace. He set vigorously to 
work to study Blackstone, and made himself master of as much 
law as he was able, instead of blundering on, as many of his 
neighbours were content to do. Partly by this knowledge, partly 
by his good-humour, he gained considerable influence in the 
quorum, which used to meet once a fortnight at the little inn, 
called the Lobster-house ; and the people used to say they were 
" going to get a little of Mr Smith's lobster-sauce." By dint of {his 
powerful voice, and a little wooden hammer, he prevailed on Bob 
and Betty to speak one at a time. He always tried, and often 
succeeded, in turning foes into friends. Having a horror of the 
Game-law r s, then in full force, and knowing, as he states in his 
speech on the Reform Bill, that for every ten pheasants which 
fluttered in the wood one English peasant was rotting in gaol, he 
was always secretly on the side of the poacher, much to the in- 
dignation of his fellow-magistrates, who in a poacher saw a 



n8 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

monster of iniquity ; and he always contrived, if possible, to let 
him escape, rather than commit him to gaol, with the certainty of 
his returning to the world an accomplished villain. He endea- 
voured to avoid exercising his function as a magistrate in his own 
tillage when possible, as he wished to be at peace with all his 
parishioners. 

Young delinquents he never could bear to commit. He would 
read them a severe lecture, and in extreme cases would call out, 
"John, bring me my private gallows/" which infallibly brought 
the little urchins weeping on their knees, entreating, " Oh ! for 
God's sake, your honour, pray forgive us !" and his honour used 
graciously to pardon them for that time, and delay the arrival of 
the private gallows : he seldom had occasion to repeat the threat. 
Indeed, imprisonment was a subject on which his mind was much 
occupied. He was greatly interested by the account of Mrs Fry's 
benevolent exertions in prisons, and on one occasion, during a 
visit to town, he requested permission to accompany her to New- 
gate. I have heard him say he never felt more deeply affected or 
impressed than by the beautiful spectacle he there witnessed ; it 
made him, he said, weep like a child. In a sermon he preached 
shortly after, he introduced the following passage : — 

" There is a spectacle which this town now exhibits, that I will 
venture to call the most solemn, the most Christian, the most 
affecting which any human being ever witnessed. To see that 
holy woman in the midst of the wretched prisoners ; to see them 
all calling earnestly upon God, soothed by her voice, animated by 
her look, clinging to the hem of her garment ; and worshipping her 
as the only being who has ever loved them, or taught them, or 
noticed them, or spoken to them of God ! This is the sight which 
breaks down the pageant of the world ; which tells us that the 
short hour of life is passing away, and that we must prepare by 
some good deeds to meet God ; that it is time to give, to pray, to 
comfort ; to go, like this blessed woman, and do the work of our 
heavenly Saviour, Jesus, among the guilty, among the broken- 
hearted and the sick, and to labour in the deepest and darkest 
wretchedness of life." 

On another occasion he beautifully describes real charity, as 
" that which no labour can weary, no ingratitude detach, no horrors 
disgust ; that toils, that pardons, that suffers ; that is seen by no 
man, and honoured by no man ; but, like the great laws of nature, 
does the work of God in silence, and looks to future and to better 
worlds for its reward." 

In February 1815, we set out on a visit to the late Sir George 
Philips, near Manchester ; and great was the generalship, and 
various the contrivances, to persuade the far-famed Immortal to . 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



119 



convey us all, in the depth of winter, safely over Blackstone Edge, 
a sort of Alps between Yorkshire and Lancashire ; but, under such 
a Hannibal, all prospered, and the Immortal covered itself with 
glory. In this house we spent some weeks so agreeably, — I 
believe, I may say, to both parties, — that the visit was by mutual 
consent repeated every two or three years. There was a constant 
succession of agreeable guests ; and our kind host so revelled in 
my father's humour, that he was incessantly stimulating him to 
attack him, which my father certainly did most vigorously ; yet I 
believe no one present enjoyed these attacks more than Sir George 
himself, who laughed at them almost to exhaustion. 

After our return home, the chief event in the course of the 
summer, which broke the even tenour of our lives, was a first visit 
from our great neighbours, Lord and Lady Carlisle. Though not 
begun under the most favourable auspices, it must be mentioned 
in these simple annals ; as from this visit proceeded not only much 
agreeable society, but twenty years of such warm friendship ; such 
delicate, unvarying, unoppressive kindness ; such essential bene- 
fits, from every member of that family, both old and young, as 
must always be remembered with gratitude by us, contributing as 
they did to the pleasure and comfort of my father's life, and giving 
him a command of books and society, which would otherwise have 
been quite out of his reach. In a letter written many years after- 
wards he says, " Castle Howard befriended me when I wanted 
friends ; I shall never forget it till I forget all." 

Our infant colony was still in so rude a state, that roads, save 
for a cart, had hardly been thought of. Suddenly, however, a cry 
was raised, that a coach and four, with outriders, were plunging 
about in the midst of a ploughed field near the house, and showing 
signals of distress. Ploughmen and ploughwomen were immedi- 
ately sent off to the rescue ; and at last the gold coach (as Lady 
Carlisle used to call it), which had mistaken the road, was guided 
safely up to the house, and the kind old Lord and Lady, not a little 
shaken, and a little cross at so rough a reception, entered the par- 
sonage. The shakes were soon forgotten, and good humour re- 
stored ; and after some severe sarcasms on the state of the approach 
to our house on the part of the old Earl, and promises of amend- 
ment on the part of my father, Lord Carlisle * drove off, and made 
us promise to come and stay with him at Castle Howard. 

This was the first and last difficulty the Earl ever found in 
coming to Foston. From this time a week seldom passed without 
his driving over to occupy his snug corner by the parsonage fire- 
side, when his conversation was so epigrammatic and full of anec- 
dotes of past times, that it was always a most agreeable half-hour 

* Grandfather of the present Earl of Carlisle. 



120 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

to old and young. He never went away without leaving some little 
gift In the shape of game, fruit, flowers, or other token of kind- 
ness. 

In 1816, my father lost his only sister, Maria, my mother's 
earliest friend. She was a charming person in mind and char- 
acter,* but had very delicate health, and lived unmarried with her 
father at Bath. My father was much attached to her, and felt her 
loss severely. He says, in a letter, " The loss of a person whom I 
would have cultivated as a friend, if nature had not given her to 
me as a relation, is a serious evil." We all went to see my grand- 
father in consequence of her death, and remained some time with 
him. 

On our return home, our poor friend Mr Horner came to pay us 
a farewell visit at Foston, where he was loved and valued as a 
brother. His health, which had been gradually failing, gave great 
anxiety to all his friends, and he was condemned to go and end 
his short but noble career in a foreign land. His mind appeared 
more pure and beautiful than ever ; but it was a melancholy visit, 
extinguishing all hope, for death was stamped on his brow. Yet, 
young as he was, his virtues had created, in the hearts of all who 
knew him, a lasting monument of love and esteem, which death 
alone can destroy. My father says, in the sketch he wrote of Mr 
Horner, "There was in his look a calm, settled love of all that was 
honourable and good ; an air of wisdom and of sweetness. You 
saw at once that he was a great man, whom nature had intended 
for a leader of human beings ; you ranged yourself willingly under 
his banners, and cheerfully submitted to his sway." He died at 
Pisa in the following spring, attended by his brother, and soothed 
by the frequent society and regard of the Miss Aliens, his early 
friends, who happened to be staying there.. His death was deeply 
mourned by his country. Sir James Mackintosh says, " Never 
was so much honour paid in any age or nation to intrinsic claims 
alone : a man of thirty-eight, of obscure birth, who never filled an 
office, or had the power of obliging a single living creature, and 
whose grand title to this distinction from an English House of 
Commons was the belief of his virtue." My father speaks of his 
feelings on this loss, in the following letter to Mr Horner's younger 
brother : — 

" Foston, March 23, 181 7. 
"My dear Sir, 

" I remember no misfortune of my life which I have felt so 
deeply as the loss of your brother. I never saw any man who 
combined together so much talent, worth, and warmth of heart ; 
and we lived together in habits of great friendship and affection for 

* Bobus used to say she had carried off all the good temper of the family. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 121 

many years. I shall always retain a most lively and affectionate 
remembrance of him to the day of my death. We shall be most 
happy to see you here if you can make us a visit ; I shall always 
meet you with those sentiments of regard and respect which rre 
due to yourself, but never without deep feelings of grief and 
emotion. 

" God bless you ! 
" S. S. 

" I beg of you to give my very kind regards to your father and 
mother ; it is in vain to speak of their loss, to write to them : I 
dare not do it." 

And again, in a letter to Mr Whishaw, he says : — 

" I have received a melancholy fragment from poor Horner,— a 
letter half finished at his death. I cannot say how much I was 
affected by it ; indeed, on looking back on my own mind, I never 
remember to have felt an event more deeply than his death. It is 
very requisite that there should be a monument to Horner : it will 
be some little satisfaction to us all." 

And in another, he says : — 

" I say nothing of the great and miserable loss we have all sus- 
tained. He will always live in our recollection ; and it will be use- 
ful to us all, in the great occasions of life, to reflect how Horner 
would act and think in them, if God had prolonged his life." 



From the failure of the harvest in the year 1816 the distress 
amongst the poor was excessive. The wheat was generally sprouted 
throughout the country, and unfit for bread ; and good flour was 
not only dear, but hardly to be procured. We, like our poorer 
neighbours, being unable to afford it, were obliged to consume our 
own sprouted wheat ; and we therefore lived a whole year, without 
tasting bread, on thin, unleavened, sweet-tasting cakes, like frost- 
bitten potatoes, baked on tins, the only way of using this damaged 
flour. The luxury of a return to bread can hardly be imagined by 
those who have never been deprived of it. All this bad food pro- 
duced much illness among our poor neighbours ; and a fever of a 
dangerous and infectious kind broke out in the village. My father 
was indefatigable in his exertions amongst them, going from cot- 
tage to cottage, providing them with food and medicine, and seeing 
that they were properly attended to : his medical skill stood him in 
good stead now. He found it impossible at first to prevent the 
peasants from crowding into the infected houses ; but at last the 
number of deaths so alarmed them, that he had equal difficulty in 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

inducing them to go at all, and in obtaining nurses for the sick, or 
even people to convey the bodies to the grave, till he shamed them 
into it, by threatening to become one of the bearers himself. 

He was much struck by the heroic conduct of some of the 
Quakers of the village, who, amid the general panic, were constant 
and active in their attention to the sick. " Are you aware of the 
danger ? " said my father. " Oh, we have no fears ; we are in the 
hands of God, thou knowest," was the reply. 

During the summer, Lord and Lady Holland came to look at 
the new parsonage-house, and pass judgment upon it, in their way 
to the North. They left their eldest daughter under my mother's 
care during their absence, to our great happiness ; and during her 
stay, Mr Rogers spent a week at Foston, charming old and young 
by his kindness and inexhaustible fund of anecdote. Sir Humphry 
Davy, Mr Warburton, and various others, also found their way to 
the " Rector's Head" during the summer. 

My father at this period was in the habit of riding a good deal ; 
but, either from the badness of his horses or the badness of his 
riding, or perhaps from both (in spite of his various ingenious con- 
trivances to keep himself in the saddle), he had several falls, and 
kept us in continual anxiety. He writes, in a letter : — " I used to 
think a fall from a horse dangerous, but much experience has con- 
vinced me to the contrary. I have had six falls in two years, and 
just behaved like the three per cents when they fall, — I got up 
again, and am not a bit the worse for it, any more than the stock 
in question." In speaking of this, he says, " I left off riding, for 
the good of my parish and the peace of my family ; for, somehow 
or other, my horse and I had a habit of parting company. On one 
occasion I found myself suddenly prostrate in the streets of York, 
much to the delight of the Dissenters. Another time, my horse 
Calamity flung me over his head into a neighbouring parish, as if I 
had been a shuttlecock, and I felt grateful it was not into a neigh- 
bouring planet ; but as no harm came of it, I might have per- 
severed perhaps, if, on a certain day, a Quaker tailor from a neigh- 
bouring village, to which I had said I was going to ride, had not 
taken it into his head to call, soon after my departure, and request 
to see Mrs Sydney. She instantly, conceiving I was thrown* if not 
killed, rushed down to the man, exclaiming, ' Where is he ? where 
is your master ? is he hurt ? ' The astonished and quaking snip 
stood silent from surprise. Still more agitated by his silence, she 
exclaimed, ' Is he hurt ? I insist upon knowing the worst.' 'Why, 
please, ma'am, it is only thy little bill, a very small account, I 
wanted thee to settle, 5 replied he, in much surprise. After this, you 
may suppose, I sold my horse : however, it is some comfort to 
know that my friend Sir George is one fall ahead of me, and is 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 123 

certainly a worse rider. It is a great proof, too, of the liberality of 
this county, where everybody can ride as soon as they are born, that 
they tolerate me at all." 

The horse Calamity, whose name has been thus introduced, was 
the first-born of several young horses bred on the farm, who turned 
out very fine creatures, and gained him great glory, even amongst 
the knowing farmers of Yorkshire ; but this first production was 
certainly not encouraging. To his dismay, a huge, lank, large- 
boned foal appeared, of chestnut colour, and with four white legs. 
It grew apace, but its bones became more and more conspicuous. 
Its appetite was unbounded ; grass, hay, corn, beans, food moist 
and dry, were all supplied in vain, and vanished down its throat 
with incredible rapidity. It stood, a large living skeleton, with 
famine written in its face, and my father christened it Calamity. 
As Calamity grew to maturity, he was found to be as sluggish in 
disposition as his master was impetuous ; so my father was driven 
to invent a " patent Tantalus," which consisted of a small sieve of 
corn, suspended on a semicircular bar of iron fixed to the ends of 
the shafts, just beyond the horse's nose. The corn, rattling as the 
vehicle proceeded, stimulated Calamity to unwonted exertions ; and 
under the hope of overtaking this imaginary feed, he did more 
work than all the previous provender which had been poured down 
his throat had been able to obtain from him. 

My father was very fond of his young horses, and they all came 
running to meet him when he entered the field. He began their 
education from their birth : he taught them to wear a girth, a bridle, 
a saddle, to meet flags and music, to bear the firing of a pistol at 
their heads, from their earliest years, and he maintained that no 
horses were so well broken in as his. 

After our settlement at Foston, an old lady, the widow of an 
artist, a woman of some fortune, large dimensions, considerable 
talents, and much oddity, came to establish herself in a small cot- 
tage at no great distance, and was so delighted with her neighbour, 
that she kindly offered to drop in (as she said) frequently to tea. 
My father, though the most social of human beings, felt rather 
alarmed at this threatened invasion of his privacy ; yet, unwilling 
to hurt the old lady, he at last bethought himself of writing to her 
a most comical letter, full of all sorts of imaginary facts, accepting 
her offer, only begging to have full notice of her approach : " for," 
said he, " at home I sit in an old coat, which may have a hole in 
it ; now I like to appear before you in my best. When alone we 
have the black kettle, we should have the urn for you ; Bunch 
would have on her clean apron and her hair brushed, &c. &c." 
This answered very well for both parties. But the tale goes 
further. The good widow, ripe in years, at last died, leaving her 



124 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

property to an amiable young female friend, whom she had 
adopted, and who thus became our neighbour. About the same 
time, an Italian refugee, of very good family, had come to settle at 
York, and most honourably endeavoured to support himself by 
giving lessons in Italian. He brought letters of introduction to my 
father from Lord Holland, who had known him or his family in 
Italy. We found him to be a man of talent, cultivation, and high 
feeling, and the more we saw of him the more we liked him. The 
Count and our neighbour frequently met at our house, and as a 
mutual liking seemed to be springing up, my father thought it 
right to make further inquiries respecting the character of the 
former ; and finding it most satisfactory, he promoted their inter- 
course, which ended in a marriage from our house. The evening 
before the marriage, my father, fearing that the poor Count, from 
the necessary preparations for his marriage, might possibly be in 
some little difficulty for his immediate necessities, delicately offered 
to assist him ; but, with a burst of gratitude, in his own beautiful 
tongue he joyously exclaimed, " Grazie ! grazie ! mille volte grazie, 
Canonico dottissimo e benefico ! ho tutto pagato, ed ho ancora 
questo in tasca" — holding forth half-a-crown. He did not live very 
many years to enjoy his good fortune, but we had frequent oppor- 
tunities during that period of hearing of their mutual happiness. 

It was about this period, I believe, that, by Lord Ossory's death, 
the living of Ampthill, then vacant, came into the gift of his 
nephew, Lord Holland, who immediately wrote, with his usual 
kindness, to offer it to my father. But as this living was untenable 
with Foston, and of inferior value, my father was obliged to relin- 
quish what to him would have been a source of constant enjoyment, 
the vicinity to Lord Holland and all his early friends ; and to turn 
his mind, with renewed vigour, to the growing necessities of his 
little northern colony, which had suffered for the moment by this 
change of prospects put before him. 

When supplying these necessities, nothing was more amusing 
than to accompany my father in a round of shopping, or providing 
for the ship, as he called it. On entering a shop where he was 
known, all were eager to serve him. Gradually, as he talked, all 
other business was suspended, and both customer and shop-boy 
were often seen forgetting their own business, and turning round 
to listen. In five minutes he seemed to know more of each man's 
trade than he knew himself, and had extracted from him, before he 
was aware, not only all he meant to tell, but all he meant to con- 
ceal ; and was off on his road again, laden with useful knowledge, 
before the astonished burgher was aware of the wisdom which had 
gone out of him. 

About this time we were on a visit to Bishopthorpe ; and my 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 125 

father had recently preached a visitation sermon, in which, amongst 
other things, he had recommended the clergy not to devote too 
much time to shooting and hunting. The Archbishop, who rode 
beautifully in his youth, and knew full well my father's deficiencies 
in that respect, said, smiling and evidently much amused, " I hear, 
Mr Smith, you do not approve of much riding for the clergy." 
" Why, my Lord," said my father, bowing with assumed gravity, 
" perhaps there is not much objection, provided they do not ride 

too well, and stick out their toes professionally." Mr M , a 

Catholic gentleman present, looking out of the window of the room 
in which they were sitting, "Ah, I see," said my father, laughing, 
" you think you will get out, but you are quite mistaken ; this is 
the wing where the Archbishop shuts up the Catholics ; the other 
wing is full of Dissenters." 

Coming down one morning at Foston, I found Bunch pacing up 
and down the passage before her master's door, in a state of great 
perturbation. "What is the matter, Bunch?" "Oh, ma'am, I 
can't get no peace of mind till I 've got master shaved, and he 's so 
late this morning ; he 's not come down yet." This getting master 
shaved, consisted in making ready for him, with a large painter's 
brush, a thick lather in a huge wooden bowl, as big as Mambrino's 
helmet, which she always considered as the most important avoca- 
tion of the morning 

Johnson says, " The truly strong and sound mind is the mind 
that can embrace equally great things and small." If this defini- 
tion be just, my father's mind fully deserved these epithets, for he 
thought nothing unworthy of his talents that could be improved by 
them. " I dislike those large white blinds," I remember he said on 
one occasion ; " I can't afford painted ones ; now, girls, why not 
try patchiuoj'k ? Get rich glazed cottons, combine your colours 
well, and select a classical pattern, and I am sure the effect will be 
very good." We exclaimed, laughed at him, remonstrated, declared 
it would be hideous, but obeyed. Each took a window ; and under 
my mother's skilful direction, much to our own surprise, we exe- 
cuted his idea with such success that the Combe Florey and Fos- 
ton blinds excited universal admiration ; and there are many now 
alive who, I dare say, remember them, and some who imitated 
them. 

Hearing that an old friend, a lawyer of great eminence, with his 
family, had been unexpectedly detained at York by the dangerous 
illness of a near relation, whilst his two little girls were just recover- 
ing from the whooping-cough and pining for fresh air, my father 
immediately insisted that the latter should be sent to Foston, and 
entrusted to my mother's care. This made us a little anxious, as 
he had never had the complaint himself: a rule therefore was 



126 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

made, that the dear little girls were never to approach him nearer 
than arm and stick length. I can see him even now, laughingly- 
warding them off, or, to their great delight, running away from 
them as they pursued him in the garden, and their bright young 
faces in merry conference with him at the end of his stick when 
they at last brought him to bay. Years have passed away since 
that time, and they, after growing up to beauty both of mind and 
body, have long, long since, I will not say sunk into their graves, 
but risen to that heaven, of which their pure and blameless lives 
made all who knew them feel they were worthy. No evil ensued \ 
and this little incident only served to cement still closer a friend- 
ship of many years' standing. I only allude to it now to show my 
father's forgetfulness of self where his heart was concerned. 

He never indulged in any pleasures in which his family did not 
share. Passionately fond of books, he hardly added one volume, 
through all his years of poverty, to the precious little store he 
brought down with him from London ; although without a Cyclo- 
paedia, or many of those books of reference, of which he so often 
felt the want in his literary pursuits. These circumstances render 
yet more remarkable all that he has said and done during this 
period. When a present of books arrived (no very unfrequent 
event) from some of his kind old friends, who knew the pleasure it 
would afford, he was almost child-like in his delight, particularly 
if the binding was gay ; and I have often been summoned (in my 
office of librarian, which I held, together with that of apothecary's 
boy) to arrange and re-arrange them on the shelves, in order to 
place them in the most conspicuous situation. 

We all had our offices : he appointed my sister (who, from her 
talents, was well fitted for it) to be his Livy ; and we have often 
laughed over his suggestions as to how our domestic events ought 
to be recorded for the advantage of posterity. But his Livy was 
carried off by marriage when she was too young, I fear, to have 
made any progress in her history. My dear mother, from her skill 
in domestic economy, he christened Mrs Balwhidder, in allusion to 
that pretty tale by Gait, called " Annals of the Parish," which he 
delighted in. Annie Kay was prime minister. In short, my father 
infused something of his spirit into the most commonplace events 
of life, and could not order even a dose of physic for his carter but 
there was fun and originality in the act. 

It is said that nobody could stand with Burke under a doorway 
in a shower of rain without discovering that he was an extraordinary 
man : so of my father, I have heard it often said that it was im- 
possible to converse with him for five minutes, and not feel he was 
not like other men. I have seen him melt an exquisite of the first 
water, in a most amusing manner. Being very punctual (too 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 127 

punctual indeed, — it was the only virtue he made disagreeable), he 
not unfrequently arrived to dinner before the lady of the house was 
dressed, and received her company for her. A dandy would appear 
all glorious without, whose neckcloth, shirt, and white gloves were 
unimpeachable, and the evident result of profound study ; and who, 
not having been introduced, of course, in true English style, ap- 
peared unconscious that another mortal was in the same room with 
him. My father, whose neckcloth always looked like a pudding 
tied round his throat, and the arrangement of whose garments 
seemed more the result of accident than design (yet, I ought to add, 
as I am now writing for those who knew him not, always looked 
like a gentleman, in its best sense,— that is, as one who deserved 
respect),— eyed him calmly for a minute, as if to take his measure, 
then addressed him. The dandy started, and bowed stiffly over 
his neckcloth. The second observation made him evidently say to 
himself, " Can that observation come out of that neckcloth ?" The 
third convinced him there was something better or at least equal to 
neckcloths in the world ; and by the time the lady of the house 
arrived they had sworn eternal friendship. 

In the summer of this year, 1817, my uncle and his family joined 
us for a month at Scarborough, and afterwards returned with us to 
Foston ; and it was during this visit that, finding my father quite 
unable to afford sending his eldest son Douglas to school, he most 
kindly offered to assist him. Not thinking himself justified in re- 
fusing Douglas so great an advantage, my father accepted a 
hundred a year for this purpose ; and in the following year placed 
him at Westminster school, which he quitted some years after with 
great distinction, as Captain of the College. 

In 1820 my father went on a visit for a few days to Lord Grey's ; 
then to Edinburgh, to see Jeffrey and his other old friends ; and 
returned by Lord Lauderdale's house at Dunbar. Speaking of this 
journey, he says, " Most people sulk in stage coaches, I always talk. 
I have had some amusing journeys from this habit. On one occasion, 
a gentleman in the coach with me, with whom I had been convers- 
ing for some time, suddenly looked out of the window as we ap- 
proached York, and said, ' There is a very clever man, they say, 

but a d s odd fellow, lives here, — Sydney Smith, I believe.' 

t He may be a very odd fellow,' said I (taking off my hat to him 
and laughing), ' and I dare say he is ; but odd as he is, he is here, 
very much at your service.' Poor man ! I thought he would have 
sunk into his boots, and vanished through the bed of the carriage, 
he was so distressed ; but I thought I had better tell him at once, 
or he might proceed to say I had murdered my grandmother, which 
I must have resented, you know. 



128 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" On another occasion, some years later, when I was going to 
Brougham Hall, two raw Scotch girls got into the conch in the dark, 
near Carlisle. ' It is very disagreeable getting into a coach in the 
dark,' exclaimed one, after arranging her bandboxes ; ' one cannot 
see one's company.' ' Very true, Ma'am, and you have a great loss 
in not seeing me, for I am a remarkably handsome man.' l No, 
Sir ! are you really ? ' said both. c Yes, and in the flower of my 
youth.' ' What a pity ! ' said they. We soon passed near a lamp- 
post : they both darted forward to get a look at me. ' La, Sir, you 
seem very stout.' ' Oh no, not at all, Ma'am, it 's only my great 
coat' 'Where are you going, Sir ?' ' To Brougham Hall.' 'Why, 
you must be a very remarkable man to be going to Brougham Hall.' 
1 I am a very remarkable man, Ma'am.' At Penrith they got out, 
after having talked incessantly, and tried every possible means to 
discover who I was, exclaiming as they went off laughing, ' Well, 
it is very provoking we can't see you, but we'll find out who you 
are at the ball. Lord Brougham always comes to the ball at Pen- 
rith, and we shall certainly be there, and shall soon discover your 
name.' " 

In the summer, Dr and Mrs Marcet came with their two 
daughters to spend some days with us. 

Mrs Marcet writes : — " Mr Smith was talking after breakfast 
with Dr Marcet, in a very impressive and serious tone, on scientific 
subjects, and I was admiring the enlarged and philosophic manner 
in which he discoursed on them, when suddenly starting up, he 
stretched out his arms and said, ' Come, now let us talk a little 
nonsense.' And then came such a flow of wit, and joke, and anec- 
dote, such a burst of spirits, such a charm and freshness of manner, 
such an irresistible laugh, that Solomon himself would have yielded 
to the infection, and called out, Nonsense for ever ! " 

I have been told that it is the opinion of one who knew my father 
well, and whose opinion I value, that I have hardly done justice to 
the more serious part of his character. If this be so, I have indeed 
done him grievous wrong ; for this was the foundation, or rather 
storehouse, from which all his wit and imagination sprang, and 
which gave them such value in the eyes of the world ; yet it is a 
wrong by no means easy to remedy. The expression of my father's 
face when at rest was that of sense and dignity ; and this was the 
picture of his mind in the calmer and graver hours of life : but 
when he met (as we sometimes do) with a passage that bore the 
stamp of immortality, his countenance in an instant changed and 
lighted up, and a sublime thought, sight, or action, struck on his 
soul at once, and found a kindred spark within it. Yet, with a 
mind so keenly sensitive to the sublime, and so capable of appreci- 
ating all that was exalted in human nature, with a memory well 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 129 

stored with the rich treasures that genius has left us, my father 
never, on principle, either in himself or others, encouraged those 
vague speculations on the unknown hereafter, or indulged in that 
craving desire to pierce through the darkness that surrounds the 
spiritual world, and glance into the Holy of Holies, so often found 
in men of great genius : not because he was without sympathy 
with such feelings, as some have supposed, for no one dealt more 
tenderly with the troubled mind when such fell under his care, but 
because he early felt the danger of such speculations, and how 
many of the noblest minds had been darkened and paralyzed by 
them — " dazzled by excess of light." His clear, healthy understand- 
ing saw at one glance that God hath said to man, " Thus far shalt 
thou go and no further ; " and seizing therefore on religion with a 
firm grasp, he made it his strong staff and support in life ; and, ac- 
cording to its precepts, doing his duty in that state of life in which 
it had pleased God to place him, he calmly trusted to the mercy of 
God for his reward, obeying the precept he ever taught, to " cast 
your care upon God, for He careth for you." 

Mrs Marcet has just spoken of his rapid transition from sense to 
nonsense : I remember an instance of his equally rapid transition 
from gaiety to the deepest pathos. Some ladies walking with me, 
seeing my father sitting at his singular writing establishment in 
the bay, went in through his glorified windows, and established 
themselves round his table, he talking in his gayest and most ani- 
mated manner to us all. In an instant one of those sublime ideas 
which find their way to every heart passed through his mind ; his 
countenance and tone changed, and he gave expression to the 
thought within him, with a pathos that touched all, for there was 
a tear in every eye. Strange to say, vivid as this scene is to my 
mind, I can neither recall a word he said, nor the subject of the con- 
versation ; but it struck me as an instance of his great power and 
versatility of talent. 

His reasoning powers are sufficiently exhibited to the world in 
his works. He loved argument on serious and important subjects, 
but always after his own fashion ; throwing aside all extraneous 
matter, and by two or three pointed questions, marching up at once 
to the point. He argued with perfect temper in society, or if he 
saw the argument becoming long or warm, in a moment he dashed 
over his opponent's trenches, and was laughingly attacking him on 
some fresh point. Some men are said to have passed through life 
without knowing even the sensation of fear ; such I should conceive 
to be the state of my father's mind with respect to envy or hatred — 
they were feelings so alien to his nature that he hardly discerned 
them when they existed in others. He gloried in excellence, and 
sought it in whatever rank of life it was to be found. He speaks 

I 



130 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

with admiration of " those great men on whom God has breathed 
a larger portion of his Spirit, and sent into the world to enlarge the 
empire of talents and of truth; who are the pillars of fire which 
brighten the darkness of the night and make straight the paths of 
the wilderness." In conversing on serious subjects he aimed at 
truth ; but, as a distinguished judge of our day said of the beautiful 
portraits of Richmond, " He aimed at truth, but in his hands it was 
truth lovingly told." In sorrow or misfortune, he used to say, the 
great sting is self-reproach. In all the important affairs of life a 
man ought to make every possible exertion that he can with honour, 
and then, and not till then, sit down and cast his care upon God, 
for He careth for him. I have heard him say, " Some very excellent 
people tell you they dare not hope ; why do they not dare to hope? 
To me it seems much more impious to dare to despair." I have 
already shown that he studied much, and had always some useful 
purpose in hand. The real way to improve, he said, is not so much 
by varied reading, as by finding out your weak points on any subject, 
and mastering them ; this was his constant practice. But to return 
to Mrs Marcet. 

"I was coming down-stairs the next morning (she continues), 
when Mr Smith suddenly said to Bunch, who was passing, ' Bunch, 
do you like roast duck or boiled chicken ?' Bunch had probably 
never tasted either the one or the other in her life, but answered, 
without a moment's hesitation, ' Roast duck, please, Sir/ and dis- 
appeared. I laughed. ' You may laugh,' said he, ' but you have 
no idea of the labour it has cost me to give her that decision of 
character. The Yorkshire peasantry are the quickest and shrewdest 
in the world, but you can never get a direct answer from them ; if 
you ask them even their own names, they always scratch their 
heads, and say, ' A's sur ai don't knaw, Sir ;' but I have brought 
Bunch to such perfection, that she never hesitates now on any 
subject, however difficult. I am very strict with her. Would you 
like to hear her repeat her crimes ? She has them by heart, and 
repeats them every day.' 

"'Come here, Bunch!' (calling out to her), 'come and repeat 
your crimes to Mrs Marcet ;' and Bunch, a clean, fair, squat, tidy 
little girl, about ten or twelve years of age, quite as a matter of 
course, as grave as a judge, without the least hesitation, and with 
a loud voice, began to repeat — ' Plate-snatching, gravy-spilling, 
door-slamming, blue-bottle fly-catching, and curtsey-bobbing.' 
' Explain to Mrs Marcet what blue-bottle fly-catching is.' ' Stand- 
ing with my mouth open and not attending, Sir.' ' And what is 
curtsey-bobbing ?' ( Curtseying to the centre of the earth, please, 
Sir.' ' Good girl ; now you may go. She makes a capital waiter, 
I assure you ; on state occasions Jack Robinson, my carpenter, 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 131 

takes off his apron and waits too, and does pretty well, but he 
sometimes naturally makes a mistake and sticks a gimlet into the 
bread instead of a fork.'" 

A short time after, being on a visit at Lord 's, we were sitting 

with a large party at luncheon, when our host's eldest son, a fine 
boy of between eight and nine, burst into the room, and running 
up to his father, began a playful skirmish with him. The boy, 
half in play, half in earnest, hit his father in the face, who, to carry 

on the joke, put up both his hands, saying, " Oh, B , you have 

put out my eye." In an instant the blood mounted to the boy's 
temples, he flung his little arms round his father, and sobbed in 
such a paroxysm of grief and despair, that it was some time before 
even his father's two bright eyes beaming on him with pleasure 
could convince him of the truth, and restore him to tranquillity. 
When he left the room, my father, who had silently looked with 
much interest and emotion on the scene, said, " I congratulate 
you ; I guarantee that boy ; make your hearts easy ; however he 
may be tossed about the world, with those feelings, and such a 
heart, he will come out unscathed." The father, one of those who 
consider their fortune but as a loan, to be employed in spreading 
an atmosphere of virtue and happiness around them as far as their 
influence reaches, is now no more, and this son occupies his place ; 
but his widowed mother the other day reminded me how true the 
prophecy had proved ; and the scene was so touching that I cannot 
resist giving it. 

My father comically alludes to the solitary life we led at this 
time, saying in one of his letters to a friend, " Let us know when 
you pass, and we will write a letter to tell you whether we are at 
home or not. It is twenty to one against our being engaged, as we 
only dine out once in seven or eight years, and that septennial 
exertion was made last year." 

As our opportunities for society were thus few, my father 
occasionally took lodgings for us, during the assizes, at York, 
which enabled us to see a great deal of the principal lawyers on the. 
northern circuit. Amongst these were some of the early legal 
friends he had made when living in his little house in Doughty 
Street, such as Scarlett, Brougham, Parke, Tindal, and many 
others then beginning life, but all since become of high eminence 
in their profession. It was on the occasion of one of these York 
assizes that Lord Lyndhurst, then Sir John Copley, came there on 
a special retainer, and dined with us, together with a large party 
of lawyers ; and contributed not a little, by his powers of conver- 
sation, to one of the most agreeable dinners I ever remember. 
Little did we then guess how much he was to contribute hereafter 
to the happiness and comfort of my father's life. At this time 



i 3 2 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Hunt's trial was going on, and excited much interest in the public 
mind. My father attended through the whole trial, and has 
expressed in some of his letters how much he was struck by the 
natural and untaught ability which Hunt evinced in the conduct 
and defence of his cause. 

This summer (1820) my father went with his family to Bishop's 
Lydiard, in Somersetshire, to visit my grandfather, who, though 
now very old, was still in high vigour, both of body and mind, and, 
I think, more picturesque and agreeable than ever. 

On our return, in the autumn, we were in great danger of having 
a repetition of the disastrous harvest of 1816, from the unfavourable 
state of the weather ; and it was only by my fathers constant 
activity and energy that this calamity was prevented. By his 
presence, approbation, and good-humour, he infused into his 
workmen such activity and goodwill, that they volunteered to 
continue their labours in relays all night, and persevered until the 
harvest was saved. He came amongst them continually, and took 
care to liave large tables in the barn covered with meat and drink 
for them. 

Amongst the friends my father made during the latter part of his 
residence in London, was Mr Grattan. On the short visits to 
London which he was now able to make, he sought every oppor- 
tunity of cultivating Mr Grattan's society ; being attracted not 
only by what attracted all the world, the high character and great 
abilities of his friend, but by the ardent zeal of the latter for the 
two objects which my father had always most at heart — the welfare 
of Ireland, and Catholic emancipation. 

The death of this great man, which took place about this period 
(1820), was ascribed in a great measure to his coming over to 
England with a petition on the Catholic question, when in a state 
of health which rendered him unfit for such exertion. My father 
joined warmly in the general regret for the loss of such a man, and, 
in an article in the Edinburgh Review on " Ireland," shortly after, 
expresses his admiration in a sketch of his friend, which being as 
short as it is beautiful, I shall extract. 

" Great men hallow a whole people, and lift up all who live in 
their time. What Irishman does not feel proud that he has lived 
in the days of Grattan ? Who has not turned to him for comfort, 
from the false friends and open enemies of Ireland ? who did not 
remember him in the days of its burnings, wastings, and murders ? 
No Government ever dismayed him — the world could not bribe 
him — he thought only of Ireland : lived for no other object, 
dedicated to her his beautiful fancy, his elegant wit, his manly 
courage, and all the splendour of hi? astonishing eloquence. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 133 

" He was so born, so gifted, that poetry, forensic skill, elegant 
literature, and all the highest attainments of human genius were 
within his reach ; but he thought the noblest occupation of a man 
was to make other men happy and free ; and in that straight line 
he kept for fifty years, without one side-look, one yielding thought, 
one motive in his heart which he might not have laid open to the 
view of God or man." 



CHAPTER VIII. 

legacy — Visit to Edinburgh — Visits London — Popularity — Letters Home and Care 
of Parish— Takes Son to Charterhouse— Visits Mr Rogers — Appointed Chaplain to 
High Sheriff— Preaches in Cathedral — Anecdote of Spencer House — Meeting of 
Clergy, East Riding— Petition — Speech— Living of Londesborough — Goes to 
Paris— Letter on Receiving Irreligious Book — Death of Father — Description of 
House by Friend — Love of Chess and Singing — Marriage of Youngest Daughter — 
Becomes Canon of Bristol— Effect produced at Bristol— Apologue. 

About this time an old lady, Aunt Mary by name, who possessed 
considerable wealth, suddenly proposed to pay us a visit ; and, as 
it seemed, so much approved all she saw in the little establishment 
at Foston, that on her death, in the following year, she left my 
father a most unexpected legacy. Though not large, it then 
seemed to us unbounded wealth. On receiving this accession of 
fortune, my father of course immediately released my uncle from 
the contribution he had so kindly made toward the expenses of my 
brother's education. His next step was to call us around him, say- 
ing, " You must all share in this windfall : so choose something you 
would like." We all made our selection, and often had cause to 
bless the memory of old Aunt Mary. 

In the winter of the year 1821, we all went to Edinburgh on a 
visit to Lord Jeffrey, after ten years' absence. It was a most agree- 
able visit ; for, in addition to the enjoyment of Lord Jeffrey's 
society at every stray moment he could steal from business, we 
were received with open arms by all our old Scotch friends ; and 
when they do open their arms, there are no people so kind and so 
hospitable as the Scotch. 

In May, the next year (1822), my father went to stay a short 
time at his brother's house in town, as indeed he usually did every 
spring. The rush of invitations, and the struggle for his society, 
when on his visits to London, would have been quite enough to 
turn any head less strong than his. Many weeks before he set off 
he used to receive invitations ; and I have known him engaged 
every night during his stay, for three weeks beforehand. But in 
the midst of all this dissipation, and popularity he never forgot his 
home and family. Every morning, at breakfast, appeared his letter 
to my mother, giving an account of his daily proceedings, together 
with minute directions about the farm and parish ; not always, it 
must be admitted, in the most legible writing. A family council 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 135 

was often held over his directions ; once, so entirely without suc- 
cess, that, after many endeavours on our part to decipher them, as 
they seemed urgent, my mother cut out the passage and enclosed 
it to him ; he returned it, saying, "he must decline ever reading his 
own handwriting four-and-twenty hours after he had written it." 
He was so aware of the badness of his writing, that in a letter to 
Mr Travers, who wished to see one of his sermons, he says, " I 
would send it to you with pleasure, but my writing is as if a swarm 
of ants, escaping from an ink-bottle, had walked over a sheet of 
paper without wiping their legs." The handwriting of his friend 
Lord Jeffrey was, if possible, still more illegible : my father wrote 
to him, on receiving one of his letters, " My dear Jeffrey, — We are 
much obliged by your letter, but should be still more so, were it 
legible. I have tried to read it from left to right, and Mrs Sydney 
from right to left, and we neither of us can decipher a single word 
of it." 

The interests of his villagers, too, were not neglected. On one 
occasion, in a broiling sun, with no other equipage than his 
umbrella, he paced down to one of the public offices to obtain 
some information about a young soldier, the only son of a poor 
labourer and his wife, who were in a state of great anxiety about 
him, not having received any tidings of him for months. My 
father entered the office, hot, tired, and dusty, and I dare say very 
11-dressed ; and proceeded to put the necessary questions to one 
of the young officials, in all the splendour of whisker and waist- 
coat ; but, after much delay and cool impertinence, obtained no 
satisficto 7 answer. He then said, giving his card and making his 
bow, " I have but one other question to trouble you with, Sir, and 
that is your name ; as I am about to proceed from this door to call 
on your master. I came here a country clergyman, to perform my 
duty to my parish, and I shall inform him how his servants perform 
theirs." These words acted like magic. In an instant the youth 
stood humbled before him, " entreating pardon and silence ; that 
he had nothing to depend on but his office, and this would ruin 
him." My father of course yielded, but warned him to let this be 
a useful lesson for the future. 

One day in the winter of the following year, about six o'clock in 
the evening, we were assembled round a blazing fire, waiting for 
dinner. The weather had been unusually severe, and the roads 
were so filled by drifts of snow, that they were considered quite 
impassable. The butcher and the baker even could hardly make 
their way on horseback to the house, and the front door was so 
blocked up by snow as to be quite unapproachable. Suddenly a 
tremendous peal was heard on the bell : all started at the unwonted 
sound in such a season and at such an hour, and were lost in 



136 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

conjectures what it could mean. Bunch rushed to the door, and 
presently entered the room breathless, exclaiming, " Please, Sir, 
Lord and Lady Mackincrush is com'd in a coach-and-four, and wants 
to slay with you, but they can't get up to the front door ! " Who 
Lord and Lady Mackincrush could be, and why they bestowed them- 
selves upon us, was alike a mystery. But Sydney, calling for a lan- 
tern, sallied forth, and found to his no less joy than surprise, his old 
friend Sir James Mackintosh and his daughter, half buried in the 
snow. They were extracted, warmed, and welcomed, as such friends 
ought to be ; or rather, with such means as the little parsonage could 
furnish. The next morning, while we were sitting at breakfast, ar- 
rived, to our infinite amusement, Sir James's letter, announcing his 
intended visit, and asking whether we could receive him. 

My father's sketch, in the Life of Sir James, shows his estimate 
of this great man ; and the keen enjoyment his society ever 
afforded him was enhanced by the rarity of their meeting, now 
that he was so far removed from his former friends. 

Sir James stayed with us a few days ; and left behind not recol- 
lections only, but hat, books, gloves, papers, and various portions 
of his wardrobe, with characteristic carelessness. " What a man 
that would be," said my father, " had he a particle of gall, or the 
least knowledge of the value of red tape !" As Curran said of 
Grattan, " he would have governed the world." 

In 1823, having received a presentation to the Charterhouse 
from the Archbishop of York for his second son, Wyndham, he 
took him there in the spring. While he was in town, Mr Rogers 
says, " I had been ill some weeks, confined to my bed. Sydney 
heard of it, found me out, sat by my bed, cheered me, talked to 
me, made me laugh more than I ever thought to have laughed 
again. The next day a bulletin was brought to my bedside, giving 
the physician's report of my case ; the following day the report was 
much worse ; the next day declaring there was no hope, and Eng- 
land would have to mourn over the loss of her sweetest poet ; then 
I died amidst weeping friends ; then came my funeral ; and, lastly, 
a sketch of my character, all written by that pen which had the 
power of turning everything into sunshine and joy. Sydney never 
forgot his friends !" 

In the course of the summer a young friend came to spend a 
month with us, the freshness and originality of whose character 
both interested and amused my father ; he chanced on one occa- 
sion to call her " a nice person." " Oh, don't call me ' nice, 1 Mr 
Sydney ; people only say that where they can say nothing else." 
"Why? have you ever reflected what 'a nice person' means?" 
"No, Mr Sydney," said she laughing, "but I don't like it." 
" W r ell, give me pen and ink ; I will show you," said my father, " a 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 137 

"DEFINITION OF 'A NICE PERSON.' 

"A nice person is neither too tall nor too short, looks clean and 
cheerful, has no prominent feature, makes no difficulties, is never 
misplaced, sits bodkin, is never foolishly affronted, and is void of 
affectations. 

" A nice person helps you well at dinner, understands you, is always 
gratefully received by young and old, Whig and Tory, grave and gay. 

" There is something in the very air of a nice person which in- 
spires you with confidence, makes you talk, and talk without fear 
of malicious misrepresentation ; you feel that you are reposing 
upon a nature which God has made kind, and created for the 
benefit and happiness of society. It has the effect upon the mind 
which soft air and a fine climate have upon the body. 

" A nice person is clear of little, trumpery passions, acknowledges 
superiority, delights in talent, shelters humility, pardons adversity, 
forgives deficiency, respects all men's rights, never stops the bottle, 
is never long and never wrong, always knows the day of the month 
and the name of everybody at table, and never gives pain to any 
human being. 

" If anybody is wanted for a party, a nice person is the first 
thought of; when the child is christened, when the daughter is 
married, — all the joys of life are communicated to nice people ; 
the hand of the dying man is always held out to a nice person. 

" A nice person never knocks over wine or melted butter, does not 
tread upon the dog's foot, or molest the family cat, eats soup without 
noise, laughs in the right place, and has a watchful and attentive eye." 

This same year (1823), his eldest son, Douglas, having left West- 
minster with great distinction (having been elected Captain of the 
College, after struggling with unusual difficulties), went in the 
autumn to Christ Church, Oxford.* My father mentions also, in 

* " His father had always taught him the Eton grammar. The intention of sending 
him to Westminster was sudden. The change of grammar was a dreadful difficulty, 
only a few months before the competition which was to admit him as a King's scholar. 
In addition to this, a most severe fever seized him shortly after he went to Westminster, 
and for six weeks kept him confined to his bed : but so eager was he for success, for 
our sakes, that even while keeping his bed from fever and weakness, he ever had his 
Westminster grammar under his pillow ; and, too ill to get up, he was incessantly work- 
ing at it, in spite of all we could say. The challenges last about six weeks ; there were, 
this year, twenty-eight candidates, of whom eight were admitted ; and dear Douglas 
was sixth, to our inexpressible joy ; for I verily believe it would have broken his heart 
had he failed, so very desirous was he, on this first occasion that had occurred in his 
young life, to repay by his success all the anxious and agitating fears his father had felt 
about him for the future. Having become a King's scholar, the hardships and cruelties 
he suffered, as a junior boy, from his master, were such as at one time very nearly to 
compel us to remove him from the school. He was taken home for a short period, to 
recover from his bruises, and restore his eye. His first act, on becoming Captain him- 



138 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

his letters, a most agreeable visit he made in the autumn to Bowood, 
meeting there Lord Holland, Luttrell, Rogers, and some other friends. 

In 1824, my father took us for a short time to town, Miss Vernon 
having kindly lent us her house in Hertford Street. We returned 
to York for the assizes, as he had been appointed by Sir John 
Johnstone (then High Sheriff) his chaplain ; and it was upon this 
occasion that he preached in the Cathedral two remarkable ser- 
mons, upon the unjust judge, and the lawyer who tempted Christ. 
There was great curiosity to hear him, particularly amongst the 
lawyers on the Northern Circuit, to most of whom he was person- 
ally known. The Cathedral was crowded to the utmost. I well 
remember the startling effect on every one present when, after 
rising and looking round with that calm dignity so peculiar to him 
in the pulpit, he slowly delivered, with his powerful voice (the two 
judges sitting immediately opposite), this text : " God shall smite 
thee, thou whited wall ; for sittest thou to judge me according to 
the law, and commandest me to be smitten contrary to the law?" 
From this opening his audience were little prepared for the follow- 
ing splendid eulogium which he pronounced on the office of an 
English judge, such as it is now exercised in this country. 

" He who takes the office of a judge, as it now exists in this 
country, takes in his hands a splendid gem, good and glorious, per- 
fect and pure. Shall he give it up mutilated ? shall he mar it ? 
shall he darken it ? shall it emit no light ? shall it be valued at no 
price ? shall it excite no wonder ? shall he find it a diamond ? shall 
he leave it a stone ? 

" What should we say of the man who would wilfully destroy 
with fire the magnificent temple of God in which I am now preach- 
ing ? Far worse is he who ruins the moral edifice of the world, 
which time and toil, and many prayers to God, and many suffer- 
ings of men have reared ; who puts out the light of the times in 
which he lives, and leaves us to wander in the darkness of corrup- 
tion and the desolation of sin. 

" There may be, there probably is, in this church some young 
man who may hereafter fill the office of an English judge, when 
the greater part of those who hear me this day are dead and gone. 
Let him remember my words, and let them form and fashion his 
spirit. He cannot tell in what dangerous and awful times he may 
be placed : but, as a mariner looks to his compass in the calm, 
and looks to his compass in the storm, and never keeps his eye off 
his compass, so in every vicissitude of a judicial life, — deciding for 
the people, deciding against the people, — protecting the just rights 
of kings, or restraining their unlawful ambition, — let him ever cling 

self, was to endeavour to ameliorate the condition of the juniors, and to obtain addi- 
tional comforts for them from the head-master."— From my Mother's Journal. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 139 

to that pure, exalted, and Christian independence which towers 
over the little motives of life, which no hope of favour can influence, 
which no effort of power can control." 

During one of his visits to London, at a dinner at Spencer 
House, the conversation turned upon dogs. " Oh," said my father, 
"one of the greatest difficulties I have had with my parishioners 
has been on the subject of dogs." " How so ? " said Lord Spencer. 
" Why, when I first went down into Yorkshire, there had not been 
a resident clergyman in my parish for a hundred and fifty years. 
Each farmer kept a huge mastiff dog, ranging at large, and ready 
to make his morning meal on clergy or laity, as best suited his 
particular taste. I never could approach a cottage in pursuit of 
my calling, but I rushed into the jaws of one of these shaggy 
monsters. I scolded, preached, and prayed, without avail ; so I 
determined to try what fear for their pockets would do. Forth- 
with appeared in the county papers a minute account of a trial of 
a farmer, at the Northampton Sessions, for keeping dogs uncon- 
fined ; where said farmer was not only fined five pounds and repri- 
manded by the magistrates, but sentenced to three months' im- 
prisonment. The effect was wonderful, and the reign of Cerberus 
ceased in the land." " That accounts," said Lord Spencer, " for 
what has puzzled me and Althorp for many years. We never 
failed to attend the sessions at Northampton, and we never could 
find out how we had missed this remarkable dog case." 

In the year 1825, a meeting of the clergy of the diocese was 
called, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, to petition Parliament 
against the emancipation of the Catholics ; it was held at the 
Tiger Inn, Beverley. My father, though much disliking such 
meetings, felt that, if they were called, it was his duty to attend ; 
and, attending, to speak. Two petitions were sent up to Parlia- 
ment j one to the House of Lords, to be presented by the Arch- 
bishop of York ; the other to the Commons, by Sir Robert Peel ; 
these were assented to unanimously by all the clergy present, my 
father's being the only dissentient voice* 

* "A Petition drawn up by the Rev. Sydney Smith, to be proposed at a meeting of 
the Clergy at Cleveland, in Yorkshire, in 1825. 

" We, the undersigned, being clergymen of the Church of England, resident within the 
Diocese of York, humbly petition your Honourable House to take into your consideration 
the state of those laws which affect the Roman Catholics of Great Britain and Ireland. 

"We beg of you to inquire whether all those statutes, however wise and necessary in 
their origin, may not now (when the Church of England is rooted in the public affection, 
and the title to the throne undisputed) be wisely and safely repealed. 

'"'We are steadfast friends to that Church of which we are members, and we wish no 
law repealed which is really essential to its safety ; but we submit to the superior wisdom 
of your Honourable House, whether that Church is not sufficiently protected by its an- 
tiquity, by its learning, by its piety, and by that moderate tenor which it knows so well 



Mo MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

In the very interesting Life of Dr Bathurst, Bishop of Norwich, 
lately published by his daughter, she states, that at an advanced 
stood alone in the House of Lords to advocate the cause of 
religious toleration against all the Bench of Bishops. She speaks 
with honest pride of the just admiration his courage obtained from 
his friends, and the gratitude of the Ministry. But if this required 
such courage in the " Good Bishop" who came to that House in- 
vested with the dignity of high office, and with all the weight of 
the family connection whose influence first placed him there, will 
it be ungraceful in me to ask, Did it not require courage in my 
father, under a Tory administration, himself still young, poor, with 
a heavy debt hanging over him, without family or friends to sup- 
port him there, to come forward alone, in opposition to the whole 
clergy of his diocese, to advocate the same cause ? * In this speech 
he describes the advance the Catholic question had made during 
the session, from the astonishment of the House at the union of the 
Irish Catholics ; and then, alluding to the effects the penal laws 
were producing in Ireland, he says, " We preach to our congrega- 
tions that a tree is known by its fruits. What has your system 
done for Ireland? Her children, safe under no law, live in the 
very shadow of death. Has it made Ireland rich ? has it made 
Ireland loyal? has it made Ireland free? has it made Ireland 
happy ? From the principles of this system, from the cruelty of 
these laws, I turn, and turn with the homage of my whole heart, to 
the memorable proclamation which the monarch of these realms 
has lately made to his dominions of Hanover, ''That no man should 
be subjected to civil incapacities on account of religious opinions. 1 
This sentiment in the mouth of a king deserves, more than all 
glories and victories, the notice of the historian who is destined to 
tell to future ages the deeds of the English people. I hope he will 
lavish on it every gem which glitters in the cabinet of genius ; and 
so uphold it to the world, that it will be remembered when Water- 



how to preserve amidst the opposite excesses of mankind ; — the indifference of one age, 
and the fanaticism of another. 

" It is our earnest hope that any indulgence you might otherwise think it expedient to 
extend to the Catholic subjects of this realm may not be prevented by the intemperate 
conduct of some few members of that persuasion ; that in the great business of framing 
a lasting religious peace for these kingdoms, the extravagance of over-heated minds, or 
the studied insolence of men who intend mischief, may be equally overlooked. 

"If your Honourable House should in your wisdom determine that all these laws 
which are enacted against the Roman Catholics cannot with safety and advantage be 
repealed, we then venture to express a hope that such disqualifying laws alone will be 
suffered to remain, which you consider to be clearly required for the good of the Church 
and State. We feel the blessing of our own religious liberty, and we think it a serious 
duty to extend it to others, in every degree which sound discretion will permit." 

* I hope I shall not be understood as wishing to depreciate one whom all good men 
must admire, but as only desirous of doing justice to my father. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 141 

loo is forgotten, and when the fall of Paris is blotted out from the 
memory of man." 

About this period a very considerable and most unexpected ad- 
dition was made to my father's income by the kind intercession and 
exertion of our friends at Castle Howard, who obtained from the 
Duke of Devonshire the living of Londesborough (at no great dis- 
tance from Foston, and then tenable with it), for him to hold till the 
Duke's nephew, Mr Howard, should be of age to take it. This, 
together with Aunt Mary's legacy, put him, for the first time in his 
life, tolerably at his ease, as he had by this time liquidated many 
of the first heavy expenses entailed upon him by building. But the 
debt to Queen Anne's Bounty, raised on the value of the living, 
together with many large bills, still remained, and up to this time 
we had been obliged to exercise the most rigid economy. These 
debts weighed heavily on my father's spirits; giving him, as my 
mother has often told me, sleepless nights of anxiety as to the future 
provision for his children. When bill after bill poured in, he used 
to sit at his desk in an evening, carefully examining them, and 
gradually paying them off. On these occasions, I have not unfre- 
quently seen him quite overcome by the feeling of the debt hanging 
over him; he would cover his face in his hands, and exclaim, " Ah ! 
I see, I shall end my old age in a gaol !" This was the more strik- 
ing from one whose buoyancy of spirits usually enabled him to rise 
above all difficulties. It made a deep impression upon us ; and I 
remember many little family councils, to see if it were not possible 
to economise in something more, and lessen our daily expenses to 
assist him. 

The following year my father accomplished what he had long 
wished, but had never been able to afford, — a visit to Paris. He 
there found Lord and Lady Holland, and many other English 
friends, and was introduced by them to some of the best French 
society. He has given his impressions of Paris in his letters to my 
mother. These Paris letters are, I am sorry to say, almost the only 
ones written to her which have been preserved ; for though, when 
absent, he wrote to my mother regularly every day, yet the interest- 
ing matter they contained was so mixed up with directions and 
home details, that they were not considered of permanent value. 
The only purchase he made for himself in Paris, though he brought 
us all a gift, was a huge seal, containing the arms of a peer of 
France, which he met with in a broker's shop, and bought for four 
francs : this he declared should henceforth be the arms of his 
branch of the Smith family. From what he witnessed during his 
stay, and observing how little wisdom the Bourbons seemed to have 
gained from misfortune, he predicted the revolution which took 
place so few years afterwards. He renewed there his early ac- 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

quaintance with two remarkable men, Talleyrand and Pozzo di 
. oi whom he saw a good deal. 

. r his return we had a visit from Lord Jeffrey ; our old and 
valued friend Mr Whishaw, the Hannibal of his suppers ; and Mr 
John Romilly, now Master of the Rolls. 

My father, however he might indulge in attacks on what he 
thought the shortcomings of the Church, never for a moment 
tolerated anything approaching to irreligion, even in his most 
private transactions. He received about this time a work of irre- 
ligious tendency from the house of a considerable publisher in 
London, who was in the habit of occasionally presenting him with 
books. Many men might have passed this over as of little import- 
ance ; but he felt that nothing was unimportant that had reference 
to such a subject. He immediately wrote to the publisher, saying, 
that " he could not be aware that he had sent him a work unfit to 
be sent to a clergyman of the Church of England, or, indeed, of 
any church ; " and after counselling him against such publications, 
even with a view to mere worldly interests, he adds, " I hate the 
insolence, persecution, and intolerance, which so often pass under 
the name of religion, and, as you know, have fought against them ; 
but I have an unaffected horror of irreligion and impiety, and every 
principle of suspicion and fear would be excited in me by a man 
who professed himself an infidel." These feelings were strongly 
evinced on various occasions, in some of his early letters to Jeffrey. 
He not only deprecates the injury to the Edinburgh Review by the 
admission of irreligious opinions ; but declares his determination, 
if this were not avoided, of separating himself from a work of which 
he had felt hitherto so justly proud. He writes to Jeffrey : — " I 
hear with sorrow from Elmsley, that a very anti-christian article 
has crept into the last number of the Edinburgh Review. . . . 
You must be thoroughly aware that the rumour of infidelity decides 
not only the reputation, but the existence of the Review. I am 
extremely sorry, too, on my own account, because those who wish 
it to have been written by me, will say it was so." And again, in 
another letter : — " I must beg the favour of you to be explicit on 
one point. Do you mean to take care that the Review shall not 
profess infidel principles ? Unless this is the case I must ab- 
solutely give up all connection with it." 

In 1827 the Junction Ministry was formed, which combined a 
portion of the Whigs with the remains of Mr Canning's party. My 
father, knowing that there were in this Ministry many upon whom 
he had just claims, finding his family now grown up, his son about 
to enter on an expensive profession,* and aware that his clerical 

* He was destined for the Law. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 143 

income would shortly be diminished to nearly one-third by the 
resignation of the living of Londesborough to Mr Howard, felt it 
due to himself and his family to make some application to his 
friends for preferment. He wrote therefore to one or two of those 
in the Ministry, and likewise to his friend Lord Brougham, stating 
to the latter his hopes and wishes, and requesting his influence 
with those in power, though he did not then belong to the Ministry. 
From Lord Brougham I have reason to believe he received the 
answer he had a right to expect from so very old a friend. From 
one of the others he received an answer politely deferring his 
promises to some future period, as I presume from the following 
reply, which is so very characteristic of my father, and so very un- 
like the usual mode of address from an expectant clergyman to a 
minister of state, that I shall give it ; though without a name, as I 
have not asked permission to insert it. 

" 20 Saville Row. 
" I am much obliged by your polite letter. You appeal to my 
good-nature to prevent me from considering your letter as a decent 
method of putting me off : your appeal, I assure you, is not made 
in vain. I do not think you mean to put me off ; because I am the 
most prominent, and was for a long time the only clerical advocate 
of that question, by the proper arrangement of which you believe 
the happiness and safety of the country would be materially im- 
proved. I do not believe you mean to put me off; because, in 
giving me some promotion, you will teach the clergy, from whose 
timidity you have everything to apprehend, and whose influence 
upon the people you cannot doubt, that they may, under your 
Government, obey the dictates of their consciences without sacri- 
ficing the emoluments of their profession. I do not think you 
mean to put me off; because, in the conscientious administration 
of that patronage with which you are entrusted, I think it will occur 
to you that something is due to a person who, instead of basely 
chiming in with the bad passions of the multitude, has dedicated 
some talent and some activity to soften religious hatreds, and to 
make men less violent and less foolish than he found them. 

" I am, sincerely yours, 

" Sydney Smith." 

We received a visit in the autumn from a clergyman, who, though 
a comparatively recent friend, was one ever highly valued by my 
father, and who was afterwards promoted :o the Bench. A letter 
he wrote on this occasion, descriptive of his visit, which has been 
most kindly sent me by his widow, is so graphic, and it is so flatter- 
ing to my father that such a letter should have been written by 



144 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

such a man, that I cannot resist inserting it here, though it speaks 
oi things some oi which have been alluded to before. 

M A man's character is probably more faithfully represented in 
the arrangements of his home than in any other point ; and Foston 
is a fac-simile of its master's mind, from first to last. He had no 
architect, but I question whether a more compact, convenient 
house could well be imagined. In the midst of a field, command- 
ing no very attractive view, he has contrived to give it an air of 
snugness and comfort, and its internal arrangements are perfect. 
The drawing-room is the colour you covet, the genuine chromium, 
with a sort of yellow flowering pattern. It is exquisitely filled with 
irregular regularities, — tables, books, chairs, Indian wardrobes ; 
everything finished in thorough taste, without the slightest reference 
to smartness or useless finery ; and his inventive genius appears 
in every corner ; his fires are blown into brightness by shadrachs, 
tubes furnished with air from without, opening into the centre of 
the fire ; his poker, tongs, and shovel are secured from falling 
with that horrid crash which is so destructive to the nerves and 
temper. 

" His own study has no appearance of comfort ; but as he reads 
and writes in his family circle, in spite of talking and other inter- 
ruptions, this is of less consequence. In other respects it has its 
attractions : there, for instance, he keeps his rheumatic armour, 
all of which he displayed out of a large bag, giving me an illustrated 
lecture upon each component part. Fancy him in a fit of rheuma- 
tism, his legs in two narrow buckets, which he calls his jack-boots ; 
round the throat a hollow tin collar ; over each shoulder a large tin 
thing like a shoulder of mutton ; on his head a hollow tin helmet, 
all filled with hot water ; and fancy him expiating upon each and 
all of them with ultra-energy. 

" His bedrooms are counterparts of the lower rooms ; in mine 
there were twenty-eight large Piranesi prints of ancient Rome, 
mounted just as we do ours, but without frames ; and, indeed, in 
every vacant part of the house he has them hung up. 

" His store-room is more like that of an Indiaman than anything 
else, containing such a complete and well-assorted portion of every 
possible want or wish in a country establishment. 

" The same spirit prevails in his garden and farm : contrivance 
and singularity in every hole and corner. 

" ' What, in the name of wonder, is that skeleton sort of machine 
in the middle of your field ? ' ' Oh, that is my universal Scratcher ; 
a framework so contrived, that every animal, from a lamb to a 
bullock, can rub and scratch itself with the greatest facility and 
luxury.' 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 145 

" I arrived there on Saturday evening, walking from York, by 
which I contrived to lose my way, and take possession of another 
man's home and drawing-room fireside for some time before the 
host appeared, and the mistake was discovered. 

" On Sunday we prepared for church. He was hoarse, so I was 
to read ; against preaching I had provided by having no sermon. 
Good heavens ! what a set-out ! The family chariot, which he calls 
the Im?nortal) from having been altered and repaired in every pos- 
sible way— the last novelty, a lining of green cloth, worked and 
fitted by the village tailor — appeared at the door, with a pair of 
shafts substituted for the pole, in which shafts stood one of his cart- 
horses, with the regular cart-harness, and a driver by its side. In 
the inside the ladies were seated : on the dicky behind I mounted 
with him ; but his servant having placed the cushions without first 
putting in the wooden board, on sitting down, we sank through, to 
his great amusement. These preliminaries being adjusted, we' set 
out. 

" The church resembles a barn more than anything else, in size 
and shape ; though, from two old Saxon doors, it shows claim to 
higher antiquity than most others. About fifty people were as- 
sembled ; I entered the reading-desk ; he followed the prayers with 
a plain, sound sermon upon the duty of forgiving injuries, but in 
manner and voice clearly proving that he felt what he said, and 
meant that others should feel it too. 

" His domestic establishment is on a par with the rest : his head 
servant is his carpenter, and never appears excepting on company 
days. We were waited upon by his usual corps domestique, one little 
girl, about fourteen years of age ; named, I believe, Mary or Fanny, 
but invariably called by them Bunch. With the most immovable 
gravity she stands before him when he gives his orders, the answers 
to which he makes her repeat verbatim, to ensure accuracy. 

" Not to lose time, he farms with a tremendous speaking-trumpet 
from his door ; a proper companion for which machine is a tele- 
scope, slung in leather, for observing what they are doing. 

" On Monday came Lady H. Hall, her two daughters, and her 
two sons ; the latter, Captain B. Hall, a rara avis I have long 
wished to see ; and Peter Tytler, son (is he not ?) to the author. 
What a charm there is in good society and well-informed people ! 
what would you not have given to have heard the mass of wit, sense, 
anecdote, and instruction that flowed incessantly ! " 

The equipage alluded to in this letter requires a little explanation. 
Our house was above a mile from the little church ; the roads to it 
were of the stiffest and deepest clay, hardly passable to women in 
wet weather or winter, and my mother was in delicate health. We 

K 



(R OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

could not afford horses ; so my father, never ashamed of showing 
his poverty when he thought it necessary, hit upon this rude and 
cheap device, to enable his family to accompany him in all weathers 
to church. Ludicrous as the description may appear to the reader, 
yet the proprieties of life were attended to. The horse, the harness, 
the "Immortal," and the carter,all wore their best and cleanest Sun- 
1 think they excited respect rather than ridicule 
amidst his humble congregation. 

A word, too, ought to be said in explanation of the drawing-room 
furniture alluded to in this letter with so much praise. It consisted 
of a few relics preserved from the valuable Indian furniture left by 
my grandmother, the greater part of which had been parted with by 
my mother for our benefit. All the rest was plain enough, though 
still in good taste. Economy, in the estimation of common minds, 
often means the absence of all taste and comfort ; my father had 
the rare art to combine it with both. For instance, he found it 
added much to the expense of building to have high walls ; he 
therefore threw the whole space of the roof into his bedrooms, 
coved the ceilings and papered them, and thus they were all airy, 
gay, cheap, and pretty. Cornices he found expensive ; so not one 
in the house, but the paper border was thrown on the ceiling with 
a line of shade under it : this relieved the eye, and atoned for their 
absence. Marble chimney-pieces were too dear ; so he hunted out 
a cheap, warm-looking Portland stone, had it cut after his own 
model, and the result was to produce some of the most cheerful, 
comfortable-looking fireplaces I remember, for as many shillings 
as the marble ones would have cost him pounds. 

After my father became rich, toward the close of life, he amus- 
ingly alludes, in one of his letters, to the joy my mother would 
feel on finding he had put up marble chimney-pieces in his town- 
house.* 

In his youth my father had been very fond of the game of chess, 
but had left it off for many years. He suddenly took it into his 
head to resume it this winter, and selected me, faute de mieux, as 
his antagonist. His mode of play was very characteristic, — bold, 
rapid attack, without a moment's pause or indecision, which I suspect 
would have exposed him to danger from a more experienced 
adversary ; but as it was, with a profound contempt for my skill, 
promising me a shilling if I beat him, he sat down with a book in 
his hand, looked up for an instant, made a move, and beat me 
regularly every night all through the winter. At last I won my 
shilling, but lost my playfellow ; he challenged me no more. 

My father was very fond of singing, but rather slow in learning a 
song, though, when once he had accomplished it, he sang it very 

* See Letter to Mrs Holland in the Correspondence. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 147 

correctly. As he never tired of his old friends, and had always 
some new one on the stocks, there was a tolerable variety of songs 
to select from ; and, with my mother's beautiful accompaniment 
(she was a very accomplished musician) and his own really fine 
voice, our trios succeeded in pleasing him so much, that he would 
often encore himself. He was so perfectly natural, that though I 
think (and I have heard many people remark it) the general ten- 
dency of his conversation was to underrate himself, yet whenever 
he was particularly pleased or satisfied with anything he had said 
or done, he would say so as frankly as if he had been speaking of 
another person. " There is one talent I think I have to a remark- 
able degree," I have heard him say : " there are substances in 
nature called amalgams, whose property is to combine incongruous 
materials ; now I am a moral amalgam, and have a peculiar talent 
for mixing up human materials in society, however repellent their 
natures." And certainly I have seen a party, composed of materials 
as ill-assorted as the individuals of the " happy family" in Trafalgar 
Square, drawn out and attracted together by the charm of his 
manner till at last you would have believed they had been born 
for one another. 

On the 1st of January 1828 his youngest daughter, Emily, was 
married by the Archbishop of York to Mr Hibbert, in the little 
barn-church before mentioned. On the 24th of the same month 
Lord Lyndhurst, then Chancellor, although differing entirely from 
my father in politics, had the real friendship and courage to brave 
the opinions and opposition of his own party, and, from private 
friendship and the respect he had for his character and talents, to 
bestow on him a stall which was then vacant at Bristol. Two 
interesting family events coming closely upon each other. 

For this promotion he always felt deeply grateful to Lord Lynd- 
hurst, as it was of the greatest importance to him ; less in a pecu- 
niary point ot v iew (as, though rendering permanent what was 
before temporary^ it rather diminished than increased his previous 
income), than from breaking that spell which had hitherto kept 
him down in his profession, and enabling him to show the world 
how well he could fulfil its duties, wherever placed. This was 
strikingly exemplified at Bristol, where a strong prejudice was felt, 
not only against himself, by a large party, but against the Church 
generally ; Bristol being full of Dissenters, and the cathedral almost 
deserted at the time of his arrival. There was a good deal of 
curiosity excited to learn what course he would take. 

My father entered on his duties in March, and preached several 
sermons ; but in the following November he availed himself of the 
first public occasion that had offered itself to make known his 
opinions there, and to show that they remained unchanged by time 



i 4 S MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

or place on the subject of religious toleration, by preaching a sermon 
on the 5th of November, before the Mayor and Corporation. They 
came expecting to hear the usual attack on Catholics made on these 
occasions, and were much startled and astonished at hearing re- 
ligious toleration preached from the pulpit of their cathedral, and 
from the lips of a dignitary of the Church. The following letter, 
sent to me by Lord Hatherton, gives my father's account of what 
passed : — 

" Lower College Green , Bristol^ 
" November 7, 1828. 

" My dear Littleton, — Many thanks for your game, and for your 
entertaining and interesting letter from Ireland. I direct to your 
country place, not knowing exactly where you will be, and presum 
ing Mrs Littleton will know. Putting all things together, I think 
something will be done. The letter from the three foolish noblemen, 
the failure of Penenden-heath to excite a general and tumultuous 
feeling, are all very favourable. I share in your admiration of 
Lord Anglesey's administration ; I have reason to believe Ministers 
are a little dissatisfied with his disposition to oratory, which is 
thought undignified and rash in a Vice-King. 

"At Bristol, on the 5th of November, I gave the Mayor and 
Corporation (the most Protestant Mayor and Corporation iir 
England) such a dose of toleration as shall last them for many a 
year. A deputation of pro-Popery papers waited on me to-day to 
print, but I declined. I told the Corporation, at the end of my 
sermon, that beautiful rabbinical story quoted by Jeremy Taylor, 
' As Abraham was sitting at the door of his tent,' &c, &c, which, 
by the bye, would make a charming and useful placard against the 
bigoted. 

" Be assured I shall make a discreet use of the intelligence you 
give me, and compromise you in nothing. 

" Remember me, if you please, to Wilmot Horton when you 
write ; I like him very much, and take a sincere interest in his wel- 
fare. 

" Ever yours, dear Littleton, very sincerely, 

" Sydney Smith." 

I have heard that this sermon occasioned an immense sensation 
at the time, " and the cathedral, from that period, whenever he was 
to preach (though previously almost deserted), was filled to suffo- 
cation. A crowd collected round the doors long before they were 
opened, and the heads of the standers in the aisle were so thick-set 
you could not have thrust in another ; and I saw the men holding 
up their hats above their heads, that they might not be crushed by 
the pressure." 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 149 

u He preached," says an eye-witness, " finely and bravely on this 
occasion in direct opposition to the principles and prejudices of 
the persons in authority present ; and ended by that beautiful 
apologue from Jeremy Taylor, illustrating Charity and Toleration, 
where Abraham, rising in wrath to put the wayfaring man forth 
from his tent for refusing to worship the Lord his God,* the voice 
of the Lord was heard in the tent, saying, ' Abraham ! Abraham ! 
have I borne with this man for threescore years and ten, and canst 
not thou bear with him for one hour ? ' " 

" And yet," says the same eye-witness of whom I have before 
spoken, "never did anybody to my mind look more like a High 
Churchman, as he walked up the aisle to the altar, — there was an 
air of so much proud dignity in his appearance ; and when I saw 
him afterwards more intimately in private life, I became aware he 
had a lofty, brave soul, with an intense contempt for everything 
that was mean, base, or truckling." 

The following letter from Mr Everett gives some interesting in- 
formation on this remarkable apologue before alluded to :— 

" Cambridge, i8//z September 1848. 
" My dear Mrs Smith, — I duly received, a short time since, your 
very interesting letter of the 7th of July, with the copy of Mr Smith's 
speech, so kindly sent by you, and the memorandum relative to the 
Parable on Persecution. The speech, like everything from the 
same source, breathes a spirit of noble liberality and sound sense, 
which cannot be too highly praised. I am greatly indebted to you 
for giving me the opportunity of adding it to the collection of his 
works. 

* Extract from the "Liberty of Prophesying," by Jeremy Taylor, D.D., ed. 1657, p- 
606:— ■ 

§ 22. " I end with a story which I find in the Jew's 1 Books. When Abraham sat at 
his tent-door, according to his custom, waiting to entertain strangers, he espied an old 
man stooping and leaning on his staffe, weary with age and travelle, coming towards 
him, who was an hundred years of age ; he received him kindly, washed his feet, pro- 
vided supper, caused him to sit down ; but observing that the old man eat and prayed not, 
nor begged for a blessing on his meat, asked him why he did not worship the God of 
heaven. The old man told him that he worshipped the fire only, and acknowledged no 
other God : at which answer Abraham grew so zealously angry, that he thrust the old 
man out of his tent, and exposed him to all the evils of the night and an unguarded con- 
dition. When the old man was gone, God called to him and asked him where the 
stranger was ; he replied, • I thrust him away because he did not worship Thee ; ' God 
answered him, ' I have suffered him these hundred years, although he dishonoured me, 
and couldst not thou endure him one night, when he gave thee no trouble ? ' Upon this, 
saitb. the story, Abraham fetcht him back again, and gave him hospitable entertainment 
and wise instruction. Go thou and do likewise, and thy charity will be rewarded by 
the God of Abraham." 

1 Gentius, the Latin translator or Saadi at Amsterdam, was that Jew, as appears by 
its being copied into Taylor's second edition, subsequent to its publication at Amsterdam 
in 1651. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" The Parable on Persecution is one of the most curious topics 
in literary history. It has often been made the foundation of a 
charge of plagiarism against Ur Franklin, but, as I think, without 
foundation. In its modern form, it was first published by Lord 
Karnes, in 1774. He says, ' It was communicated to me by Dr 
Franklin of Philadelphia ; ' but he does not say that Dr F. claimed 
the authorship of it. It was not long after inserted in a small col- 
lection of Dr Franklin's miscellaneous writings, published by Mr 
B. Vaughan (a gentleman recollected by Lord Lansdowne) in 
London. Mr Vaughan took it from Lord Karnes's work. In 1788 
it was traced to its source in Gentius's preface ; and Dr Franklin 
having been then charged with plagiarism, some friend well 
acquainted with his habits vindicated him in the same work, the 
1 Repository,' in which the charge was made. These, and some 
other interesting facts, are given in the new edition (Mr Sparks's) 
of Franklin's Works, vol. ii., p. 118, which, with the note to Bishop 
Heber's Life of Jeremy Taylor, in the first volume of the works, 
p. 365, contains, I believe, all that is known on the subject. I see 
one slight mistake in this learned note : it states that the famous 
parable did not appear in the first edition of the ' Liberty of Pro- 
phesying,' which was published in 1647, but in the second, which 
was printed in 1657 ; the work of Gentius having appeared in the 
interval. I have before me a volume which purports to be the 
second edition of the ( Liberty of Prophesying,' prublished in 
London in 1702, and not containing the parable, but this is quite 
immaterial. 

" I lean a little to the opinion, that Bishop Taylor may have 
taken it from some Jewish book not yet discovered. There is no 
reason why, if he quoted Gentius, he should not have named him. 
It appears from Bishop Heber's learned note, that a Jewish author, 
whom he names, thinks he has seen the parable among the com- 
mentaries on Genesis xviii. 1 ; and it is quite a curious fact, that 
Saadi gives it as related to him, and that he, according to his own 
account* while in captivity at Tripoli, was compelled to work on 
the fortifications ' with some Jews.' Nothing seems more likely to 
have happened than that a learned Jew, being a fellow-prisoner 
with a learned Persian, should have related to him this striking 
parable, of which the personages were the great Jewish Patriarch, 
and a devotee of the old Persian superstition of fire-worship. 

" Whatever be its source, there are few teachings as impressive 
of Jewish or Christian wisdom. It is an undoubted chapter of 
that great primitive Gospel which God has written in the hearts 
and consciences of men, but which, like the page of revelation, is 
too apt to be forgotten under the influence of selfish and corrupt 
motives. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



5i 



" I rejoice to hear that Mr Smith's works are so frequently 
reprinted. In this way he will for ages to come continue to teach 
lessons of toleration and humanity to all who speak the English 
tongue. There is no one of my friends in England, with respect 
to whom I am more frequently questioned than Mr Smith ; and I 
esteem it one of the chief blessings of my residence in London to 
have known him, and been honoured with so much of his kind- 
ness. I remain, my dear Mrs Smith, with the highest regards, 
ever faithfully yours, 

" Edward Everett." 

On his appointment to the prebendal stall at Bristol, he went 
for the first time to Court, and he gives an amusing account of 
himself on the occasion. 

" I found my colleague Tate, the other day, in his simplicity 
consulting the Archdeacon of Newfoundland what he should wear 
at the levee; — a man who sits bobbing for cod, and pocketing 
every tenth fish. However, I did worse when I went, by consult- 
ing no one; and, through pure ignorance, going to the levee in 
shoe-strings instead of shoe-buckles. I found, to my surprise, 
people looking down at my feet ; I could not think what they were 
at. At first I thought they had discovered the beauty of my legs, 
but at last the truth burst on me, by some wag laughing, and 
thinking I had done it as a good joke. I was of course excessively 
annoyed to have been supposed capable of such a vulgar, unmean- 
ing piece of disrespect, and kept my feet as coyly under my petti- 
coats as the veriest prude in the country, till I could make my 
escape ; so, perhaps, after all, I had better have followed my 
friend's example." 



CHAPTER IX. 

Happiness increased by his Promotion — Death of Eldest Son — Removal to Con.bc 
Florey — Rebuilding of House — Lord Jeffrey's Last Visit — Increased Popularity at 
Bristol — Collects Contributions to Review — French Revolution — Riots at Bristol — 
Speech on Reform— Letters on Preferment — Appointed Canon of St Paul's— Death 
of Sir James Mackintosh in 1832 — Marriage of Eldest Daughter in 1834— Village 
Anecdotes — Christens Grandchild — Buys House in Charles Street — Stewardship at 
St Paul's — Tour to Holland in 1837 — Talleyrand — Conversation in London, and 
Anecdotes — Controversy about Church — Petitions to House of Lords — Inscription 
for Statue of Lord Grey. 

My father's promotion in the Church was an event which added 
very materially to his happiness. " Moralists tell you," said he, 
" of the evils of wealth and station, and the happiness of poverty. 
I have been very poor the greatest part of my life, and have borne 
it as well, I believe, as most people, but I can safely say that I have 
been happier every guinea I have gained. I well remember, when 
Mrs Sydney and I were young, in London, with no other equipage 
than my umbrella, when we went out to dinner in a hackney-coach 
(a vehicle, by the bye, now become almost matter of history), when 
the rattling step was let down, and the proud, powdered red-plushes 
grinned, and her gown was fringed with straw, how the iron 
entered into my soul." 

" I often thank God for my animal spirits. I called the other 

day on my friend and neighbour B , and found him moping 

over the fire, wringing his hands, and in a state of the deepest 

melancholy, ' Why, B , what is the matter ? Here you are 

in the prime of life, with health, talents, education, a sensible 
wife, pleasing children, just come into possession of this fine old 
place and a good fortune, and have, moreover, the inestimable 
advantage of having me for a neighbour ; what on earth can you 
want more to make you happy?' 'Very true, Sydney, very true ; 
but' (with a deep sigh) 'have you considered the state of my 
roads?' ' No,' I said, ' I have certainly not taken that point into 

consideration, but in future I will; so good morning, B .' 

Whilst I, who have never had a house, or land, or a farthing to 
spare, am sometimes mad with spirits, and must talk, laugh, or 
burst." 

He had now need of all his elasticity of spirits, for there came 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 153 

upon him what he declares was the first real sorrow he had known 
— and in truth it was a heavy one — the death of his eldest son 
Douglas, just as he had reached maturity, and gave promise of 
every excellence, both of heart and mind, that could endear him 
to his parents or gratify their pride. 

He died, after a long and painful illness, in town, in the year 
1829. I see, in my father's note-book, this simple entry: — "April 
14th. My beloved son Douglas died, aged twenty-four. Alas ! 
alas !" And afterwards : " So ends this year of my life, — a yeai 
of sorrow, from the loss of my beloved son Douglas, — the first 
great misfortune of my life, and one which I shall never forget." 
In his last hours he often called his youngest son by the name of 
Douglas, showing that even then he was still in his thoughts. 

It was perhaps well for all parties that his promotion to the 
prebendal stall at Bristol having also entitled him to one of their 
livings, it became necessary for my father to resign Foston and 
settle in Somersetshire ; and here again the kindness of Lord 
Lyndhurst enabled him to exchange Foston for the much smaller, 
but more beautifully-situated, living of Combe Florey, near 
Taunton. 

We all at the time deeply regretted leaving our old haunts in 
Yorkshire, where we had lived so long, received so much hospi- 
tality, and made so many kind friends ; but this entire change of 
scene, and the necessity for immediate exertion, was very useful to 
all under this severe affliction. 

In the following letter, just sent me by one of our kind York- 
shire neighbours, he alludes touchingly to his feelings of regret 
for his lost son Douglas. 

" Combe Florey, August 6, 1829. 
" Dear Mrs Thomson,* 
" I never heard till I came here of the intended kindness of Mr 
Thomson and yourself, with a view to my remaining in Yorkshire. 
I was sensibly touched with it, and have laid it up in the archives 
of my mind. As to wood and lawn, cedar and fir, and pine 
and branching palm, I have exchanged for the better. Good, 
excellent, and amiable friends, such as we met with at Escrick, I 
did not expect to find. Fortune may grant such favours once in a 
life, but they must not be counted upon. Your family are always 
among our sincere regrets. This is a beautiful place ; the house 
larger than Foston, with a wood of three or four acres belonging to 
it close to the house, and a glebe of sixty acres surrounding it, in a 
country everywhere most beautiful and fertile. The people are 

* The present Dowager Lady Wenlock. 



154 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

starving, — in the last stage of poverty and depression. Mrs Sydney, 
from sorrow and novelty, has forgotten her throat; I think the 
complaint has nearly vanished. I am busy from morning till 
night, in building, — not from the love of architecture, but from the 
fear oi death, — not from a preference for any particular collocation 
of stones, but from an apprehension that, disdaining all collocation 
(as they are apt to do in ancient parsonages), they should come 
thundering about my head. In the meantime I have, from time to 
time, bitter visitations of sorrow. I never suspected how children 
weave themselves about the heart. My son had that quality 
which is longest remembered by those who remain behind, — a deep 
and earnest affection and respect for his parents. God save you, 
my dear Mrs Thomson, from similar distress ! Have you read 

's America? If you have, I hope you dislike it as much as I 

do. It is amusing, but very unjust and unfair. It will make his 
fortune at the Admiralty. Then he temporizes about the Slave 
Trade ; with which no man should ever hold parley, but speak of 
it with abhorrence, as the greatest of all human abominations. 
We stay here till the beginning of the year, and then go into 
residence at Bristol. I hope to be in town in the spring, and 
hereafter to pay you a visit in Yorkshire, which will be a great 
pleasure to me. Accept, my dear Mrs and Mr Thomson, our 
united respects and regards, 

" And believe me, 

" Your sincere friend, 

" Sydney Smith." 

At Combe Florey we had almost to begin the labours of Foston 
over again, as we found the parsonage-house in a most ruinous 
state, and requiring instant attention. It was necessary almost 
entirely to rebuild it ; which occasioned a further loss to his family of 
about two thousand pounds. But my father now brought con- 
siderable experience and increased wealth to the task. Establishing 
us in one corner of the house, he turned in an immense gang of 
workmen, and in a very short time made one of the most comfort- 
able and charming parsonages I have ever seen ; a striking 
contrast, I must own, in every way, to poor Foston. Our friend 
Mr Loch, when he heard of our removal, said to my father, "Are 
you sure you have left Foston, Mr Smith?" "Yes." "Never to 
return?" "Never." "Well, then, I may venture to say that it 
was, without exception, the ugliest house I ever saw." 

The climate, the vegetation, and the soil were all in strong 
contrast to the north ; and it well deserved the name of Combe 
Florey, for it really was a valley of flowers, — a lovely little spot, 
where nature and art combined to realize the Happy Valley. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 155 

In the midst of our building operations, when the greater part 
of the roof of the house (which required renewing) was put together 
in rafters on the lawn, we received a visit from our friend Lord 
Jeffrey. I well remember our sitting out there amidst the rafters, 
surrounded by busy workmen, and, animated by the delicious 
weather and the beauty of the scene around, he and my father 
gave full play to their fancy and imagination, and nothing could be 
more delightful than to sit and watch them, and listen to the play- 
fulness and variety of their conversation. I have, I believe, 
omitted several of Lord Jeffrey's visits ; having, I am sorry to 
say, no other recollection of them than that of the pleasure they 
always afforded to both old and young. But this, I think, was his 
last visit to us ; and it was touching to observe these two eminent 
men, who had begun the struggle of life together, who had loved 
each other so long and so well, who had both now attained 
eminence and honour in their respective professions without one 
act of baseness, sitting together in this little earthly paradise, and, 
in their elder age, talking over and looking back on the past with 
all the pleasure and satisfaction arising from well-spent lives. 
Such scenes are pleasant and useful to dwell upon. 

Being now a dignitary of the Church, my father thought it more 
becoming to put his name to what he should hereafter write, and he 
therefore, about this period, withdrew from the Edinburgh Review ; 
collecting and publishing, about ten years after, the greater part of 
his contributions to it. 

In the winter of the year 1830 we all accompanied my father to 
his residence at Bristol, where his popularity increased more and 
more, in spite of the firmness with which he preached many unpalat- 
able doctrines, and the minuteness with which he felt it his duty to 
investigate all the affairs of the Cathedral and Chapter. The latter, 
up to this time, had been left veiy much to take care of themselves : 
and as it was nobody's business to look after them, they had fallen 
into great confusion and disorder. 

This year the French Revolution took place (the probability of 
which he had foretold in his letters from Paris in 1826), pro- 
ducing the greatest consternation, distress, and excitement on the 
Continent. 

In this country the riots at Bristol had broken out in the spring; 
and, later in the year, the resignation of the Duke of Wellington, 
the introduction of the Reform Bill after Lord Grey's acceptance 
of the Ministry, the opposition to it in the House of Lords, and the 
dissolution of Parliament, were exciting the deepest interest, and 
producing the greatest danger of violence and disturbance in every 
part of England. 



IS<5 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

A large county meeting was held at Taunton on the subject of 
Reform. Although, as a clergyman, my father generally avoided 
meetings that were purely political, yet at the present moment he 
saw so much dangerous excitement at work amongst the people, 
and felt the crisis to be one of such vital importance to the country, 
that he considered it the duty of every man, who had the power, to 
raise his voice in favour of law and order ; and to urge the people 
with calmness and perseverance to obtain those objects they would 
inevitably lose by violence. In this speech, amongst other things, 
he said : — 

"Nothing can be more different than personal and political fear: 
it is the artifice of our opponents to confound them together. . . . 
The greater part of human improvements, I am sorry to say, are 
made after war, tumult, bloodshed, and civil commotion. . . . 
Mankind seems to object to every species of gratuitous happiness, 
and to consider every advantage as too cheap which is not pur- 
chased by some calamity. ... I shall esteem it a singular act of 
God's providence if this great nation, guided by these warnings of 
history, not waiting till tumult for reform, not trusting reform to the 
lowest of the people, shall amend their decayed institutions, at a 
period when they are ruled by a popular Sovereign, guided by an 
upright minister, and blest with profound peace. ... If many are 
benefited by reform, and the lower orders are not injured, this 
alone is reason enough for the change. But the hewer of wood and 
the drawer of water are benefited by reform ; and the connexion 
between the existence of John Russell and the reduced price of 
bread and cheese will be as clear as it has been the object of his 
honest, wise, and useful life to make it. Don't be led away by 
nonsense. All things are dearer under a bad government, and 
cheaper under a good one. ... I am old and tired, — thank me 
for ending ; but one word more before I sit down. I am old, but I 
thank God I have lived to see more than my observations on human 
nature taught me I had any right to expect. I have lived to see an 
honest King, in whose word his ministers could trust. I have lived 
to see a King Avith a good heart, who, surrounded by nobles, thinks 
of common men ; who loves the great mass of English people, and 
wishes to be loved by them ; and who, in spite of clamour, in- 
terest, prejudice, and fear, has the manliness to carry these wise 
changes into immediate execution. Gentlemen, farewell ! Shout 
for the King ! » 

We attended him to the meeting. I had often seen the silent 
effect produced by his eloquence in crowded cathedrals, but I 
never before saw its effect on a multitude free to express their 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 157 

feelings ; and were I to live a thousand years, I should never for- 
get it. 

His voice seemed heard without effort in every part of the as- 
sembly ; his words flowed with unbroken fluency ; his language was 
simple and nervous ; he seemed to hold the very heartstrings of the 
people in his hands, and to play upon them, as upon an instru- 
ment, at his pleasure ; and when at last he sat down, the thunders 
of applause from that sea of heads beneath was perfectly thrilling. 
Such an exhibition of his powers filled one with regret that his voice 
was never likely to be raised in that assembly of his country where 
his talents and his character would have made him such an orna- 
ment, and where that noble voice would have been always raised 
for such noble purposes. 

And here I must allude to what my father was too proud to 
speak of, except in two or three confidential letters to some of his 
oldest friends. Though at this period of his life, when his health 
was to a certain degree impaired, and he was no longer equal to 
much active exertion, he had a firm conviction that a bishopric 
would be destructive of his peace and happiness, and a still firmer 
determination, in consequence, to reject it, should it ever be offered, 
yet I know he felt it deeply, to the hour of his death, that those by 
whose side he had fought for fifty years so bravely and so honestly 
in their adversity, and with the most unblemished reputation as a 
clergyman, should in their prosperity never have offered him that 
which they were bestowing on many, only known at that time, ac- 
cording to public report (whatever merits they may have since 
evinced), for their mediocrity or unpopularity. 

He says, in one of these letters, after expressing his feeling on 
this subject : — " But, thank God, I never acted from the hope of 
preferment, but from the love of justice and truth which was burst- 
ing within me. When I began to express my opinions on Church 
politics; what hope could any but a madman have of gaining pre- 
ferment by such a line of conduct ? " 

In another letter he says : — " It is perhaps of little consequence 
to any party whether I adhere to it or not ; but I always shall 
adhere to the Whigs, whoever may be put over my head ; because 
I have an ardent love of truth and justice, and they are its best 
defenders. But, adhering to them under all circumstances, I can- 
not but feel whether I am well or ill used by them." 

This silence on the subject I should have observed likewise, had 
not Lord Melbourne, with that noble candour for which his charac- 
ter was so remarkable, admitted the injury my father felt, and done 
my father the tardy justice of stating to a gentleman, a mutual 
friend, and a man of great accuracy (who came direct from his 
house expressly to state it to me), "That Lord Melbourne said 



)JR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

ums nothing he more deeply regretted, in looking back on his 
career, than the not having made Sydney Smith a bishop." 

A iuster cause of regret was, I believe, never felt. My father's 
estimate of what a bishop ought to be was so high, he was so bound 
in honour by his own writings to become what he had required others 
to be, and his power of doing what he felt he ought to do was so 
great, that, had he ever accepted the offer, I believe there would 
have been no act of the Melbourne Administration which would 
have reflected upon it greater honour and distinction.* But I again 
repeat, that although ardently desiring it when he was a younger 
man, and fired with the ambition of showing to the world how great 
a blessing a real bishop might become, I firmly believe that at this 
period of his life he would not have accepted it. But I bless Lord 
Melbourne's memory for this wish only of justice to my father. 

The following short, manly statement of his case, in a letter to 
Lord John Russell, seems, as it were, to have been extorted from 
him by that sense of justice which so powerfully influenced his 
feelings through life towards every person and on every subject, 
rather than by any wish to exalt himself ; it therefore, to a certain 

degree, carries conviction with it. " I defy to quote one 

single passage of my writing contrary to the doctrines of the Church. 
I defy him to mention a single action of my life which he can call 
immoral. The only thing he could charge me with would be high 
spirits, and much innocent nonsense. I am distinguished as a 
preacher, and sedulous as a parochial clergyman. His real charge 
against me is that I am a high-spirited, honest, uncompromising 
man, whom he and all the bench of bishops could not turn upon 
vital questions : this is the reason why, as far as depends upon 
others, I am not a bishop. But I am thoroughly sincere in saying, 
I would not take any bishopric whatever." + 

I find a letter, written by his friend Lord John Russell, in answer, 
from which I shall give an extract, as it shows that Lord Melbourne's 
wish to do justice to my father was shared likewise by his old friend, 
Lord John : — "My dear Sydney, — I think you are quite right 
not to be ambitious of the prelacy, as it would lead to much disquiet 
for you ; but if I had entirely my own way in these matters, you 
should have the opportunity of refusing it." 

And again, my father wrote at a later period to Lord Holland : — 
" You have said and written that you wished to see me a bishop, 
and, I have no doubt, would try to carry your wishes into effect. If 
proper vacancies had occurred in the beginning of Lord Grey's ad- 

* He says, on one occasion, " I hope I am too much a man of honour to take an office 
without fashioning my manners and conversation so as not to bring it into discredit." 

t I see in this letter that he strongly urges the appointment of several of his friends, 
and apparently not without effect. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. i 59 

ministration, I believe this would have been done. Other politicians 
have succeeded who entertain no such notion. But there is a still 
greater obstacle to my promotion, and that is, that / have entirely 
lost all wish to be a bishop. The thought is erased from my mind, 
and, in the very improbable event of a bishopric being offered me, 
I would steadily refuse it. In this I am perfectly honest and 
sincere, and make this communication to you to prevent your 
friendly exertion in my favour, and perhaps to spare you the regret 
of making that exertion in vain." 

I lament to find that a beautiful sketch he one day drew of what 
he conceived the duties of a bishop to be, has been lost from among 
his papers. But the following short extract from his fragment on 
the Irish Church sufficiently shows what he felt to be the duties ot 
so exalted a station. Even here, as usual, he draws no ideal 
picture of excellence, impossible to attain, and only filling the mind 
with despair, but one within the reach of any man of sense and real 
piety. 

"What a blessing to this country would a real bishop be ! . . . 

" But I never remember in my time a real bishop — a grave, 
elderly man, full of Greek, with sound views of the middle voice 
and preterpluperfect tense, gentle and kind to his poor clergy, of 
powerful and commanding eloquence, in Parliament never to be 
put down when the great interests of mankind were concerned ; 
leaning to the Government when it was right, leaning to the people 
when they were right ; feeling that if the Spirit of God had called 
him to that high office, he wj.s called for no mean purpose, but 
rather that seeing clearly, act ng boldly, and intending purely, he 
might confer lasting benefit upon mankind." 



During the period when the uncertain fate of the Reform Bill was 
spreading so much agitation and discontent throughout the country, 
there were so many mischievous publications circulating amongst 
the people, and threatening lelters so frequently sent to my father 
and other gentlemen in the neighbourhood, that he thought it right 
to endeavour to counteract them, and published some cheap letters 
for circulation amongst the poor, called " Letters to Swing," of 
which the following is one which has been accidentally preserved. 

From the " Taunton Courier" of Wednesday, Dec. 8th, 1830. 
" To Mr Swing. 

" The wool your coat is made of is spun by machinery, and this 
machinery makes your coat two or three shillings cheaper, — per- 
haps six or seven. Your white hat is made by machinery at half 



i6o MEMOIR OF THE RET. SYDNEY SMITH. 

price. The coals you burn arc pulled out of the pit by machinery, 
and are sold to you much cheaper than they could be if they were 
pulled out by hand. You do not complain of these machines, 
because they do you good, though they throw many artisans out of 
work. But what right have you to object to fanning machines, 
which make bread cheaper to the artisans, and to avail yourselves 
of other machines which make manufactures cheaper to you ? 

" If all machinery were abolished, everything would be so dear 
that you would be ten times worse off than you now are. Poor 
people's cloth would get up to a guinea a yard. Hats could not 
be sold for less than eighteen shillings. Coals would be three 
shillings per hundred. It would be quite impossible for a poor 
man to obtain any comfort. 

" If you begin to object to machinery in farming, you may as 
well object to a plough, because it employs fewer men than a spade. 
You may object to a harrow, because it employs fewer men than a 
rake. You may object even to a spade, because it employs fewer 
men than fingers and sticks, with which savages scratch the ground 
in Otaheite. If you expect manufacturers to turn against machinery, 
look at the consequence. They may succeed, perhaps, in driving 
machinery out of the town they live in, but they often drive the 
manufacturer out of the town also. He sets up his trade in some 
distant part of the country, gets new men, and the disciples of 
Swing are left to starve in the scene of their violence and folly. In 
this way the lace manufacture travelled in the time of Ludd, Swing's 
grandfather, from Nottingham to Tiverton. Suppose a free impor- 
tation of corn to be allowed, as it ought to be, and will be. If you 
will not allow farmers to grow corn here as cheap as they can, more 
corn will come from America ; for every threshing-machine that is 
destroyed, more Americans will be employed, not more English- 
men. 

" Swing ! Swing ! you are a stout fellow, but you are a bad 
adviser. The law is up, and the Judge is coming Fifty persons 
in Kent are already transported, and will see their wives and 
children no more. Sixty persons will be hanged in Hampshire. 
There are two hundred for trial in Wiltshire — all scholars of 
Swing ! I am no farmer : I have not a machine bigger than a 
pepper-mill. I am a sincere friend to the poor, and I think every 
man should live by his labour : but it cuts me to the very heart to 
see honest husbandmen perishing by the worst of all machines, the 
gallows, — under the guidance of that most fatal of all leaders, — 
Swing!" 

One of the earliest uses my father made of his increase of wealth 
was to indulge himself by enlarging his library, and supplying the 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. i6r 

deficiencies before alluded to, which he had so long suffered under. 
His books, which at Foston for many years had humbly occupied 
only the end of his little dining-room, now boldly spread themselves 
over three sides of a pretty odd room, dignified by the name of 
library, — about twenty-eight feet long and eight feet high, — ending 
in a bay-window supported by pillars, looking into the garden, and 
which he had obtained by throwing together a pantry, a passage, 
and a shoe-hole. In this pretty, gay room we breakfasted, he sat, 
and when alone we spent the evening with him. He used to say, 
" No furniture so charming as books, even if you never open them 
or read a single word." 

In the year 1831 the cholera was spreading rapidly over the 
country, and exciting the greatest alarm and anxiety. This im- 
mediately set all my father's energies to work, to have remedies at 
hand for himself and the poor of his parish, and to take every pre- 
caution which the learned suggested : one of these was, never to 
read the accounts of its progress, which often produced such panic 
that the patient was half dead of fear before the cholera arrived to 
perfect the deed. Luckily, however, neither his remedies nor his 
precautions proved necessary, as the cholera respected our little 
happy valley, and never came near us. 

Early in October, Lord John Russell and his family came to see 
us ; and a joyful visit it was, as the Whigs had again assumed the 
reins of Government under their distinguished leader Lord Grey, 
and, with their return, gave assurance of obtaining the Reform Bill, 
and thus tranquillising the country. 

Shortly after Lord John's visit to us, we went to stay with Lord 
Morley at Saltram, and whilst there my father received the news 
that Lord Grey* had appointed him to a Prebendal stall at St 
Paul's, in exchange for the one of inferior value which he then held 
at Bristol, and which had been presented to him by his friend Lord 
Lyndhurst.f These glad tidings, together with the charm of the 
place, the weather, the society of our charming hostess, and the 
many kind, warm old friends he found assembled there, who all 
seemed to rejoice really as if the benefit had been conferred on 
themselves, produced such an effect on his spirits, that it would be 
difficult to forget that week. I hardly ever remember him more 
brilliant. On his return he wrote the little squib of Mrs Partington 
and her battle with the Atlantic, which had a success quite un- 
looked for, spreading in every direction ; and sketches of Mrs Par- 
tington and her mop were to be seen in the windows of all the 
picture-shops about the country. 

* One of the first things Lord Grey said on entering Downing-street, to a relation who 
was with him, was, " Now I shall be able to do something for Sydney Smith." 

t His brother Bobus used to say that Sydney's life was the only instance of undeviat- 
ing honesty that he had ever known to answer. 

L 



i62 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

1, —This year brought with it, amongst other events, the loss 
o( one of his early and most valued friends, Sir James Mackintosh; 
just at the moment when his mind seemed in the highest vigour, 
and he was preparing for the world some of his most important 
works. 

Their strong friendship had been much cemented by the intimacy 
of my mother with the ladies of his family, and his loss was deeply 
lamented by both. My father loved to think of Sir James, to speak 
of his virtues and describe him ; and it was a gratification to his 
feelings publicly to express his admiration of his old friend in the 
letter he addressed to his son, Mr Mackintosh, and published in his 
life of his father. In this he says : — " When I turn from living 
spectacles of stupidity, ignorance, and malice, and wish to think 
better of the world, I remember my great and benevolent friend 
Mackintosh." Speaking of his love of truth, his memory, and his 
knowledge, he says : — " Those who lived with him found they 
were gaining upon doubt, correcting error, enlarging the boundaries 
and strengthening the foundations of truth." And again he says : — 
" Whatever might assuage the angry passions, and arrange the 
conflicting interests of nations ; whatever could promote peace, 
increase knowledge, extend commerce, diminish crime, and en- 
courage industry ; whatever could exalt human character, and 
could enlarge human understanding, struck at once to the heart of 
your father, and roused all his faculties. I have seen him in a 
moment, when his spirit came upon him, like a great ship of war, 
cut his cable, and spread his enormous canvas, and launch into a 
wide sea of reasoning eloquence." 

During Sir James's absence in Bombay, my father was in the 
habit of writing constantly to him, to tell him what was going 
on in Europe. But these letters, full of interest, though kindly re- 
turned by Mr Mackintosh on the death of his father, have, I fear, 
together with all the letters of my father's boyhood, preserved care- 
fully by his poor mother, Mrs Robert Smith, and given to mine, 
fallen a sacrifice to my father's mania for burning papers. I 
remember these early letters of his were most original and charac- 
teristic ; and it was one of our greatest pleasures as children to 
hear them read aloud in the evening by my mother. There was 
likewise a large collection of letters to his friend Horner, restored 
at the death of the latter by his brother Mr J. Horner, which my 
father destroyed from thinking them of no value ; but which would 
have been amongst the most interesting of his correspondence, as 
there were few whom he more loved, trusted, and honoured. 

In 1834 my father took a house for a short time in Stratford 
Place, from whence his eldest daughter was married to Dr Holland. 
On this occasion he writes to Lady Holland : — " We are about to 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 163 

be married j and Saba will be one day Lady Holland : she must 
then fit herself up with Luttrells, Rogerses, and John Russells, &c. 
&c. : Sydney Smith she has." In the summer he welcomed Dr 
Holland's three children, as if they had been his own, to spend the 
whole autumn in his house at Combe Florey. 

Whilst we were there, he was writing one morning in his 
favourite bay-window, when a pompous little man, in rusty black, 
was ushered in. " May I ask what procures me the honour of this 
visit ? " said my father. " Oh," said the little man, " I am com- 
pounding a history of the distinguished families in Somersetshire, 
and have called to obtain the Smith arms." " I regret, sir," said 
my father, " not to be able to contribute to so valuable a work ; 
but the Smiths never had any arms, and have invariably sealed 
their letters with their thumbs." 

In truth, he could not have stumbled on a more perfect Goth 
than my father on the subject of ancestral distinctions. For though 
the Smiths were not literally reduced to their thumbs, yet, feeling 
how completely he had been the maker of his own fortunes, my 
father adopted the motto for his carriage of " Faber meae fortunse." 
He loved to repeat that answer of Junot to the old noblesse, when 
boasting of their line of ancestors : " Ah, ma foi ! je n'en sais rien; 
moi je suis mon ancetre." 

During Lord- Grey's administration, which terminated in July 
1834, there had been but two or three vacancies for bishoprics in 
England (Ireland, for my father, was out of the question). There 
were, of course, numerous claims on Lord Grey ; and out of this 
small number, King William IV., from kindness to Lord Grey, 
insisted on appointing Dr Grey, his brother, without even consult- 
ing Lord Grey. Had Lord Grey had more to bestow and remained 
longer in power, I have good reason to believe that his old friend 
Sydney Smith would not have been forgotten. This belief, it has 
been seen, my father stated in his letters during Lord Grey's life ; 
and since his death I find it confirmed, from papers I possess, by 
one who best knew Lord Grey's feelings. 

I think it was about this period that an incident happened to a 
poor half-mad woman, who lived at the end of our village — with a 
drunken husband and a swarm of children — all sunk, in conse- 
quence, into a hopeless state of poverty, dirt, and idleness, save 
one son, who, strange to say, had escaped the general contagion. 
This boy, first at school, then as apprentice to a shoemaker in a 
neighbouring village, had established a high character, and was 
the pride of his old mother's heart. Unfortunately, on carrying 
home some work, he was once tempted into a public-houco to take 
(what no Somersetshire-man can resist) a draught of cider. Some 
strangers were in the room, and shortly after the boy's entrance a 



164 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

silk handkerchief was missed ; immediate search was made, and 
the handkerchief found on young Treble, to the poor boy's utter 
horror. A warrant was obtained, and the boy taken before the 
magistrates, who, from the evidence, and the general character of 
the family, were about to commit him to prison. The poor old 
mother, frantic with grief, came to my father, imploring his assist- 
ance, and asserting the entire innocence of her son. My father, no 
longer a magistrate, but touched by her sorrow, and believing the 
possible innocence of the boy from his previous knowledge of him, 
undertook the affair; went instantly to a neighbouring village, 
where the magistrates were sitting ; obtained with some difficulty a 
delay, upon his undertaking to bring fresh evidence in favour of 
the boy ; and then, with as much ardour as if his own life, and 
honour, and everything he held most dear, were at stake, he wrote, 
he investigated, he cross-examined for nearly a week, and on the 
day appointed attended the trial. He secured the best lawyer he 
could find to conduct the cause ; then, I believe, spoke for the boy 
himself; and, by the evidence he produced, succeeded in showing, 
to the satisfaction of all, that the handkerchief had been hid where 
the boy could not have hid it under the circumstances ; and that 
the real culprit was undoubtedly one of the men present, of notori- 
ously bad character, who, to save himself, when the search was 
made, dexterously contrived to stuff it down the innocent boy's 
collar as he was pretending to assist in the search. 

Treble was acquitted ; and the wild joy and gratitude of the old 
ragged mother were deeply felt by my father, and her prayers for 
her protector I cannot believe were unheard in heaven. 

As a clergyman he felt himself bound never to shrink from any 
duty, however revolting to his feelings. On one occasion he set 
out on a winter's night, lantern in hand, to visit a poor cottager 
seized with epileptic fits, of which disease, from some painful early 
associations, he had a peculiar horror ; but they wished for him, 
and he went as usual ; and I remember on his return he was much 
overpowered by the scene he had witnessed, and the recollection 
of it haunted him for many days afterwards. Several volumes of 
manuscript remain, consisting of his prescriptions for the poor, of 
which he always kept a record, that he might refer to them if 
necessary ; and they now help me to bear testimony to his atten- 
tions and kindness to them. 

Soon after coming to town the following year, at my request, he 
christened my eldest girl ; and the emotion and deep feeling he 
evinced on the occasion added not a little, I remember, to the im- 
pressiveness of that beautiful service. On this occasion Miss Fox, 
Lord Holland's sister, stood as godmother to my little girl, and 
bestowed on her her own name. A few years ago my old friend 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 165 

Mr Rogers said to me, " What a privileged person you are, to 
have had such a father and such an uncle ! " In truth I feel it so. 
But he might have added, "And such a friend as Miss Fox," 
though I must share this last with so many ; for who was ever so 
loved, so honoured, or so worthy to be so, as Miss Fox ? Not to 
speak of her understanding (which was such as is rarely bestowed 
on women), there was such an atmosphere of purity, simplicity, 
and indulgent kindness about her, that all evil passions seemed to 
fly away at her approach, and a better and more amiable tone to 
be infused into society. Her heart was as a spot to repose on in 
the moral world, a place of refuge in distress, of sympathy in joy 
or sorrow, and of warm unvarying friendship in weal or woe. 

In the autumn my father bought a small house in Charles Street, 
No. 33, near St John's Chapel, where he had preached with so 
much success when a young man on first coming to London ; and 
he gives a comical account, in one of his letters, of the short time 
he should require to paper, paint, furnish it, and set it in order. 

In October he took my mother and Mr and Mrs Hibbert to Paris 
for a short time, and in November came to town for his residence 
at St Paul's and to enter upon his new duties there, to his perform- 
ance of which (even those least known to the world, and which he 
might have neglected almost without blame) some of his fellow- 
labourers have given most kind and gratifying testimony. The 
following letter, from Mr Cockerell, architect and superintendent of 
St Paul's Cathedral, was written some years after my father's death, 

to Lady B , by whom it was sent to my mother : I give it, as 

showing a part of my father's character little known to the world — 
his powers of business. 

" Hamfistead, Oct. 24, 1851. 

" Dear Lady B , 

" I have great pleasure in committing to writing, according to 
your request, some of those anecdotes on the practical qualities 
of our lamented friend, the Rev. Sydney Smith, which you 
listened to with so much interest last year. Referring as they do 
to his Gesta as Canon Residentiary of St Paul's, superintending 
more especially the repairs of the fabric, and my agency therein as 
the appointed surveyor and paymaster, they certainly exhibit the 
bold originality of his mind, and the integrity of his habits in the 
common transactions of business, in which duty and fidelity are 
alone concerned, with as much advantage as the better-known acts 
of his public life. And you justly insist upon my relation of them, 
however humble, and commonly considered beneath the dignity ot 
biography, as perhaps more illustrative of conscientious motive 
and intrinsic merit, than the more striking talents which made him 
so justly valued and admired by the world, and as exhibiting his 



166 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

character from a point of view not hitherto perhaps taken suffi- 
ciently into account. % 

" The routine and technical conduct of the current business of 
public bodies is ordinarily committed confidentially by them to 
those hands which have been found worthy of the trust ; but on his 
appointment the new Canon avowed his diffidence of them in 
general. His experience, acquired by the habit of careful observa- 
tion, had taught him to suspect, wherever the clearest evidence of 
rectitude was deficient ; and he investigated with the greatest 
minuteness all transactions which were placed under his superin- 
tendence, and that with a severity of discipline neither called for nor 
agreeable. 

" His early communications, therefore, with myself, and I may 
say with all the officers of the Chapter, were extremely unpleasant ; 
but when satisfied by his methods of investigation, and by a ' little 
collision,' as he termed it, that all was honest and right, nothing 
could be more candid or kind than his subsequent treatment ; and 
our early dislike was at length converted into unalloyed confidence 
and regard. As he expressed himself to one of the most valued of 
our staff, 'when I heard every one speak well of you, I entertained 
the most vehement suspicions ; and I treated you as a rogue until 
I had tried you so far, that you could endure such harsh treatment 
no longer.' 

"As nothing was taken upon trust at first, great were our disputes 
as to contracts, materials, and prices : with all of which, from the 
rates in the market, to those of Portland stone, putty, and white 
lead, he armed himself with competent information : every item 
was taxed, and we owe several important improvements in the 
administration of the works and accounts to his acumen, punctuality, 
and vigour. Not only did he thus adjust and scrutinise the pay- 
ment of works, but nothing new could be undertaken without his 
survey and personal superintendence. An unpractised head and a 
podagrous disposition of limbs might well have excused the survey 
of those pinnacles and heights of our cathedral, which are to all 
both awful and fatiguing ; but nothing daunted him ; and once, 
when I suggested a fear that his portly person might stick fast in a 
narrow opening of the western towers, which we were surveying, he 
reassured me by declaring, that, ' if there were six inches of space, 
there would be room enough for him.' 

" During more than a quarter of a century of my direction of 
these repairs, I had met with no similar sacrifice of minute attention 
to this department ; and when it is remembered that this duty in 
no degree affects the funds of the Dean and Chapter, and that these 
repairs are from a separate fund, the administration of which only 
is entrusted to one of the Canons, we shall the more admire so 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 167 

conscientious a discharge of this duty. Such was the minor pro- 
cess ; but the greater measures for the enduring security of this 
magnificent cathedral were most important and conspicuous. The 
disasters of York Cathedral had exhibited the unwarrantable 
neglect, so general in these sacred edifices, of the common security 
of insurance ; and in 1840, I believe, Canterbury was the only 
cathedral church insured. St Paul's was speedily and effectually 
insured in some of the most substantial offices of London : not 
satisfied with this security, he advised the introduction of the 
mains of the New River into the lower parts of the fabric, and cis« 
terns and movable engines in the roof; and quite justifiable was his 
joke, 'that he would reproduce the Deluge in our cathedral.' 

"The fine library of the fabric, the estimation of which was 
always cited by Dean Vanmildert, had long suffered by dilapidation 
and damp ; but a stove, American indeed, and better suited to our 
slender finances than the dignity of our library, soon dispelled one 
evil, and rendered it accessible and comfortable to the studious at 
the same time ; and the bindings were all roughly, but substantially, 
repaired. The restoration of the noble model, the favourite scheme 
of Sir Christopher Wren, — now, alas ! a ruin, after one hundred 
and forty years of neglect, — was no less in his constant contempla- 
tion ; but our funds were insufficient. The successful result of a 
singular dispute as to the will of Dr Clarke, in 1675, which had 
been brought before the Chapter by our respected Chapter clerk, 
Mr Hodgson, during Mr Sydney Smith's administration, caused a 
great addition to the fabric fund, which had before been insufficient 
for its purposes, and effected an increase which it is hoped will 
secure the cathedral from dilapidation. 

" A question of law was well suited to Mr Smith's acumen and 
vigour, and he very materially assisted, during the progress of a 
suit in Chancery, instituted for the purpose of establishing the will, 
to its being brought to a speedy and satisfactory conclusion, to the 
lasting benefit of the cathedral. 

" These are some of the efficient labours of our valued friend 
within my own professional knowledge, and they might be greatly 
increased by that of my colleagues in office at St Paul's ; in proof 
of which, I am permitted by Mr Hodgson, who loved and honoured 
him, to quote a constant saying of his, ' That Mr Sydney Smith 
was one of the most strictly honest men he ever met in business.' 
Thus established in the respect and friendship, I may truly say, of 
all of us, you will conceive the regret with which I received his 
announcement, by a note, some years before his lamented departure, 
that ' I should hear with pleasure, after so much trouble, that being 
in the expectation of his first paralytic, he was about to give up his 
superintendence of my department to abler hands.' 



i6S MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" 1 have groat pleasure, dear Madam, in offering you these few 
anecdotes, in testimony of a beloved and honoured memory, how- 
ever humble and insufficiently expressed. To contribute, in any 
truthful and impartial way, to the just appreciation of an honest 
and illustrious character, is one of the most delightful duties we 
can be called upon to perform ; and surely these traits of conscience 
and integrity, of which I have been the witness only, in the fastid- 
ious, troublesome, and inconspicuous duties of the business trans- 
actions of fabric accounts and repairs, may, in this sense, well 
deserve the record to which you have so earnestly invited me. 
And I have the honour to be 4 dear Madam, your most respectful 
friend and servant, 

" C. R. COCKERELL." 

The following testimony, from his old friend the Dean of St 
Paul's, is so valuable that I cannot resist inserting it : — 

" No man, I should say, went on improving to so late a period of 
his life, both in acuteness of thought -and felicity of expression. 
. . . Indeed the business in which I am at present engaged brings 
at every turn my old friend before me. I find traces of him in 
every particular of Chapter affairs ; and on every occasion where 
his hand appears, I find stronger reason for respecting his sound 
judgment, knowledge of business, and activity of mind ; above all, 
the perfect fidelity of his stewardship. In his care of his own 
interests as member of the Chapter, there was ever the most honest 
(rarely, if I may not say singularly honest) regard for the interests 
of the Chapter and the Church. His management of the affairs of 
St Paul's (for at one time he seems to have been the manager) only 
commenced too late, and terminated too soon." 

In the autumn of the year 1837 he made a short tour in Holland, 
with my mother. He always lamented that the power of travelling, 
for which he had had always a longing desire, had been denied 
him till his body had become almost unequal to the fatigue of 
doing so. He was ever most eager to see and to hear ; but with 
the same rapidity that characterised his thoughts, he only liked first 
impressions, and never dwelt ten minutes together on the same 
scene or picture ; declared he had mastered the Louvre in a 
quarter of an hour, and could judge of Talma's powers in ten 
minutes.* 

Oji his return, by Brussels, he received much kindness and atten- 
tion from his friend M. Van de Weyer, who was then staying there, 
and made acquaintance with Madame Van de Weyer, his mother, 

* It was this love of change that made him often write and speak of Comhe Florey as 
an earthly paradise ; and again, after some weeks, describe it as un tombeau. Both 
were genuine feelings at the moment. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 169 

With whom he was excessively struck, both from her talent and her 
vigour of character. He had, whilst here, the honour of an inter- 
view with King Leopold, who afterwards sent him an invitation to 
dine with him at his palace at Lacken, and was kind enough to send 
his carriage to Brussels to take him there and bring him back. He 
felt this unexpected honour and attention from the sovereign of a 
foreign country as he ought. But am I wrong in believing that 
such honours do more honour even to the giver than the receiver? 
for are they not a pledge to the people that their sovereign prizes 
talents and honesty wherever they are found, and whether they have 
been employed, as my father says, " in protecting the just rights of 
kings or restraining their unlawful ambition " ? 

He says, in a letter from Brussels, " Holland is dear, dirty, ugly. 
I was much struck with the commercial grandeur of Amsterdam. 
You must excuse me for thinking the English to be the greatest 
and wisest nation that ever existed in the world ; we are excelled, 
however, in many things. — in buildings, cooking, baking, and in 
good manners. In setting out we went by Dunkirk, over a most 
atrocious country. With Dunkirk I was agreeably surprised ; I 
found an excellent inn, good shops, and noble church and tower, 
and altogether a handsome city. At Ypres I was delighted with 
the Hotel de Ville, one of the most magnificent Gothic buildings I 
ever saw. At Bruges the hall and tower are quite surprising, as 
is the town-house here. The Flemings are hideously ugly ; so is 
their country ; the inns are all very good. All their great towns 
are melancholy and under-peopled. . . I dined yesterday with Sir 
Hamilton Seymour. Van de Weyer has been extremely kind and 
hospitable to us, and his old mother is an excellent person. I am 
to be presented to the King to-day." 

In November he came again for his residence at St Pauls, and 
the eagerness to obtain his society seemed to increase with his 
years, and to be shared equally by Whig and Tory. He used, 
generally during his stay in town, to give an evening party once 
a week. These parties were always popular, though from the num- 
bers now assembled at them, they had not the charm of the little 
select suppers of his youth. 

One evening, at his house, a few friends had come in to tea ; 
amongst others, Lord Jeffrey, Dr Holland, and his sister. Some 
one spoke of Talleyrand. "Oh," said Sydney, "Lady Holland 
laboured incessantly to convince me that Talleyrand was agree- 
able, and was very angry because his arrival was usually a signal 
for my departure ; but, in the first place, he never spoke at all till 
he had not only devoured but digested his dinner, and as this was a 
slow process with him, it did not occur till everybody else was 
asleep, or ought to have been so ; and when he did speak he was 



i;o MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

so inai never could understand a word he said." " It was 

otherwise with me," said Dr Holland ; "I never found much diffi- 
culty in following him." " Did not you ? why, my dear Holland, it 
was an abuse of terms to call it talking at all ; for he had no teeth, 
and, I believe, no roof to his mouth — no uvula — no larynx — no 
trachea — no epiglottis — no anything. It was not talking, it was 
gargling ; and that, by the bye, now I think of it, must be the very 
reason why Holland understood him so much better than I did," 
turning suddenly round to us with his merry laugh. 

" Yet nobody's wit was of so high an order as Talleyrand's when 
jt did come, or has so well stood the test of time. You remember 
when his friend Montrond * was taken ill, and exclaimed, ' Mon 
ami, je sens les tourmens de l'enfer.' ' Quoi ! ddja ?' was his reply. 
And when he sat at dinner between Madame de Stael and Madame 
Re'camier, the celebrated beauty, Madame de Stael, whose beauties 
were certainly not those of the person, jealous of his attentions to 
her rival, insisted upon knowing which he would save if they were 
both drowning. After seeking in vain to evade her, he at last 
turned towards her and said, with his usual shrug, ' Ah, madame, 

vous savez uage?'? And when exclaimed, ' Me viola entre 

l'esprit et la beaute,' he answered, ' Oui, et sans posse'der ni l'un ni 

1' autre.' And of Madame ■ , ' Oui, elle est belle, tres-belle ; 

mais pour la toilette, cela commence trop tard, et finit trop tot.' 

Of Lord he said, ' C'est la bienveillance meine, mais la bien- 

veillance la plus perturbative que j'ai jamais connu.' To a friend 
of mine he said on one occasion, ' Miladi, voulez-vous me preter ce 
livre ? ' ' Oui, mais vous me le rendrez ? ' ' Oui.' ' Parole d'hon- 
neur?' < Oui.' ' Vous en etes surf 1 ' Oui, oui, miladi; mais, 
pour vous le rendre, il faut absolument d'abord me le preter.' 

" What a talker that Frenchman Buchon is ! Macaulay is a 
Trappist compared to him. 

" My acquaintance with Talleyrand began many years ago, when 
he was an fonigre in this country. Talking in Talleyrand's pre- 
sence to my brother Bobus, who was just then beginning his career 
at the Bar, I said, ' Mind, Bobus, when you are Chancellor I shall 
expect one of your best livings.' ' Oui, mon ami,' said Bobus, 
'mais d'abord je vous ferai commettre toutes les bassesses dont les 
pretres sont- capables.' On which Talleyrand, throwing up his 
hands and eyes, exclaimed, with a shrug, ' Mais quelle latitude 
enorme ! '" 

The conversation then turned on society in London, and its 
effect upon character. " I always tell Lady P she has pre- 
served the two impossible concomitants of a London life — a good 

* I find that Talleyrand used to tell this story as having passed between Cardinal De 
la Roche Guyon, a celebrated epicure, and his confessor 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 17I 

complexion and a good heart. Most London dinners evaporate in 
whispers to one's next-door neighbour. I make it a rule never to 
speak a word to mine, but fire across the table ; though I broke it 
once when I heard a lady who sat next me, in a low, sweet voice, 
say, ' No gravy, Sir.' I had never seen her before, but I turned 
suddenly round and said, ' Madam, I have been looking for a per- 
son who disliked gravy all my life ; let us swear eternal friendship.' 
She looked astonished, but took the oath, and, what is better, kept 

it. You laugh, Miss ; but what more usual foundation for 

friendship, let me ask, than similarity of tastes ? " 

Talking of tastes, my father quite shared in his friend Mrs Opie's 
for light, heat, and fragrance. The first was almost a passion with 
him, which he indulged by means of little tin lamps with mutton- 
fat, in the days of his poverty ; these, when a little richer, to our 
great joy, were exchanged for oil-lamps — and lastly, in the days of 
his wealth, for a profusion of wax-lights. The heat of his patent 
fire-places has been mentioned, and his delight in flowers Avas ex- 
treme. He often went into the garden the moment he was dressed, 
and returned with his hands full of roses, to place them on the 
plates at breakfast. He liked to see the young people staying in 
his house dressed with natural flowers, and encouraged us to invent 
all sorts of flowery ornaments, such as earrings and necklaces, some 
of which were really very graceful. 

The following are some little fragments of my father's conversa- 
tion in London, collected from various sources. 

Some one asked if the Bishop of was going to marry. 

" Perhaps he may," said my father ; " yet how can a bishop marry ? 
How can he flirt ? The most he can say is, ' I will see you in the 
vestry after service.' " 

" Oh, don't read these twelve volumes till they are made into a 
consom?n^ of two. Lord Dudley did still better, he waited till they 
blew over." 

Talking of tithes : " It is an atrocious way of paying the clergy. 
The custom of tithe in kind will seem incredible to our posterity ; no 
one will believe in the ramiferous priest officiating in the corn-field." 

"Our friend makes all the country smell like Piccadilly." 

An argument arose, in which my father observed how many of 
the most eminent men of the world had been diminutive in person ; 
and after naming several among the ancients, he added, " Why, 

look there at Jeffrey ; and there is my little friend , who has 

not body enough to cover his mind decently with ; his intellect is 
improperly exposed." 

" Oh, don't mind the caprices of fashionable women ; they are as 
gross as poodles fed on milk and muffins." 



1 72 ML MO IK OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" Simplicity is a great object in a great book ; it is not wanted 
in a short one." 

" You will generally sec in human life the round man and the 

angular man planted in the wrong hole ; but the Bishop of , 

being a round man, has fallen into a triangular hole, and is far better 
off than many triangular men who have fallen into round holes/' 

" The great charm of Sheridan's speaking was his multifarious- 
ness of style." 

" Fox wrote drop by drop." 

" When I took my Yorkshire servants into Somersetshire, I 
found that they thought making a drink out of apples was a tempt- 
ing of Providence, who had intended barley to be the only natural 
material of intoxication." 

" We naturally lose illusions as we get older, like teeth, but there is 
no Cartwright to fit a new set into our understandings. I have, alas ! 
only one illusion left, and that is the Archbishop of Canterbury." 

Speaking of the long debates in the House : " Why will not people 
remember the flood ? If they had lived before it with the patriarchs, 
they might have talked any stuff they pleased ; but do let them re- 
member how little time they have under this new order of things.' 

Going one morning to join a breakfast-party at the Clarendon, 
my father, on entering the room, unexpectedly found his friend 
Jeffrey prostrate on his back, and Mr Henning, the sculptor, in the 
act of covering his face with plaster of Paris, in order to take his 
cast. My father, on seeing his friend in this woful condition, as he 
stood by him burst forth in the words of Mark Antony, " Oh, 
mighty Jeffrey ! dost thou lie so low ? Are all thy conquests, 
glories, triumphs, spoils, shrunk to this little measure?" when he 
was abruptly silenced, in full career, by the voice of old Henning, 
the sculptor, exclaiming, " Stop, stop, Mr Smith ! for heaven's sake, 
stop ! If Lord Jeffrey laughs, my cast is spoilt." 

" The charm of London is that you arc never glad or sorry for 
ten minutes together ; in the country you are the one and the other 
for weeks." 

" There is a New Zealand attorney just arrived in London, with 
6s. Sd. tattooed all over his face," 

" Yes, he has spent all his life in letting down empty buckets into 
empty wells ; and he is frittering away his age in trying to draw 
them up again." 

"If you masthead a sailor for not doing his duty, why should 
you not weathercock a parishioner for refusing to pay tithes ?" 

" How is ?" "He is not very well." "Why, what is the 

matter ?" " Oh, don't you know he has produced a couplet ? When 
our friend is delivered of a couplet, with infinite labour and pain, 
he takes to his bed, has straw laid down, the knocker tied up, 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 173 

expects his friends to call and make inquiries, and the answer at the 

door invariably is, ' Mr and his little couplet are as well as 

can be expected.' When he produces an Alexandrine he keeps his 
bed a day longer." 

"You will find a Scotchman always says what is undermost. I, 
on the contrary, say everything that comes uppermost, and have all 
sorts of bad jokes put upon me in consequence. An American pub- 
lished a book, and declared I had told him there were more mad 
Quakers in lunatic asylums than any other sect ; — quite an inven- 
tion on his part. Another time Prince P M published 

my conversations ; so when I next met him, I inquired whether this 
was to be a printed or manuscript one, as I should talk accordingly. 
He did his best to blush." 

One evening, when drinking tea with Mrs Austin, the servant 
entering a crowded room, with a boiling tea-kettle in his hand, it 
seemed doubtful, nay impossible, he should make his way among 
the numerous groups ; but, on the first approach of the steaming 
kettle, the crowd receded on all sides, my father among the rest, 
though carefully watching the progress of the lad to the table : — ■ 
" I declare," said he (addressing Mrs Austin), " a man who wishes 
to make his way in life, and overcome all the difficulties in his 
path, could do nothing better than go through the world with a 
boiling tea-kettle in his hand." 

" Never neglect your fireplaces : I have paid great attention to 
mine, and could burn you all out in a moment. Much of the 
cheerfulness of life depends upon it. Who could be miserable 
with that fire ? What makes a fire so pleasant is, I think, that it 
is a live thing in a dead room." 

" Such is the horror the French have of our cuisine, that at the 
dinner given in honour of Guizot at the Athenaeum, they say his 
cook was heard to exclaim, l Ah, mon pauvre maitre ! je ne le 
reverrai plus.' " 

u Lord Wenlock told me that his ground-rent cost him five 
pounds a foot ; that is about the price of a London footman six 
foot high, — thirty guineas per annum." 

" I believe the parallelogram between Oxford Street, Piccadilly, 
Regent Street, and Hyde Park, encloses more intelligence and 
human ability, to say nothing of wealth and beauty, than the 
world has ever collected in such a space before." 

" When I praised the author of the New Poor-Law the other 
day, three gentlemen at table took it to themselves, and blushed 
up to the eyes." 

" Yes ! you find people ready enough to do the Samaritan, with- 
out the oil and twopence." 

" It is a great proof of shyness to crumble bread at dinner 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

* Oh, I sec you are afraid of me ' (turning to a young lady who sai by 
you crumble your bread.' I do it when I sit by the Bishop 
ridon, and with both hands when I sit by the Archbishop." 

Addressing Rogers : " My dear R., if we were both in America, 
we should be tarred and feathered; and lovely as we are by 
nature, I should be an ostrich and you an emu." 

•• 1 once saw a dressed statue of Venus in a serious house— the 
Venus Millinaria." 

" Ah, you flavour everything ; you are the vanille of society." 

" I fully intended going to America ; but my parishioners held a 
meeting, and came to a resolution that they could not trust me 
with the canvas-back ducks : and I felt they were right, so gave 
up the project." 

"My living in Yorkshire was so far out of the way that it was 
actually twelve miles from a lemon." 

" Of course, if ever I did go to a fancy ball at all, I should go as 
a Dissenter" 

" I think it was Luttrell who used to say ' 's face always 

reminded him of boiled mutton and near relations.'" 

" Some people seem to be born out of their proper century. 

should have lived in the Italian republics, and under 

Charles II." 

" Don't you know, as the French say, there are three sexes — 
men, women, and clergymen?" 

" One of my great objections to the country is, that you get your 
letters but once a-day ; here they come every five minutes." 

On some one offering him oat-cake, " No, I can't eat oat-cake, 
it is too rich for me." 

" Harrowgate seemed to me the most heaven-forgotten country 
under the sun. When I saw it, there were only nine mangy fir- 
trees there ; and even they all leant away from it." 

Dining at Mr Grenville's, he as usual arrived before the rest of 
the party. €ome ladies were shortly after announced; as Mr 
Grenville, with his graceful dignity and cheerfulness, went forward 
to receive them, my father, looking after him, exclaimed to Mr 
Panizzi, " There, that is the man from whom we all ought to learn 
how to grow old !" The conversation at table turned on a subject 
lately treated of in Sir Charles Lyell's book, the phenomena which 
the earth might present to the geologists of some future period ; 
" Let us imagine," said my father, " an excavation on the site of 
St Paul's. Fancy a lecture, by the Owen of some future age, on 
the thigh-bone of a Minor Canon, or the tooth of a Dean, — the 
form, qualities, the knowledge, tastes, propensities, he would dis- 
cover from them." And off he went, his imagination playing on 
this idea in every possible way. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 17$ 

Some one spoke of the state of financial embarrassment of the 
London University at that time. " Yes, it is so great, that I under- 
stand they have already seized on the air-pump, the exhausted 
receiver, and galvanic batteries ; and that bailiffs have been seen 
chasing the Professor of Modern History round the quadrangle." 

Conversing in the evening, with a small circle, round Miss 
Berry's tea-table (who, though far advanced towards the fourscore 
years and ten which she afterwards attained, was still remarkable 
for her vigour of mind and beauty of person), my father observed 
the entrance of a no less remarkable person, both for talents and 
years, dressed in a beautiful crimson velvet gown. He started up 
to meet his fine old friend, exclaiming, " Exactly the colour of my 
preaching cushion !" and leading her forward to the light, he pre- 
tended to be lost in admiration, saying, " I really can hardly keep 
my hands off you ; I shall be preaching on you, I fear," etc., and 
played with the subject to the infinite amusement of his old friend 
and the little circle assembled round her. 

" Playfair was certainly the most delightful philomath I ever 
knew." 

" Have you heard of Niebuhr's discoveries ? All Roman his- 
tory reversed ; Tarquin turning out an excellent family man, and 
Lucretia a very doubtful character, whom Lady Davy would not 
have visited." 

The ladies having left the room, at a dinner at Sir G. Philips's, 
the conversation turned on the black population of America. My 
father, turning to an eminent American jurist, who was here some 

years ago, said, " Pray, Mr , do tell us why you can't live on 

better terms with your black population." " Why, to tell you the 
truth, Mr Smith, they smell so abominably that we can't bear 
them near us." " Possibly not," said my father, " but men must 
not be led by the nose in that way : if you don't like asking them 
to dinner, it is surely no reason why you should not make citizens 
of them. 

" ' Et si non aliumlatfc jactaret odorem, 
Civis erat.'"* 

Some one complaining of the interminable length of the speeches 
in Parliament, he said, "Don't talk to me of not being able to 
cough a speaker down : try the whooping-cough." 

Mr Monckton Milnes was talking to Alderman , when the 

latter turned away : " You were speaking," said Sydney, " to the 
Lord Mayor elect. I myself felt in his presence like the Roman 
whom Pyrrhus tried to frighten with an elephant, and remained 
calm." 

" When so showy a woman as Mrs appears at a place, 

* Virgil, Georgics ii. 132. Laimts in the original. 



i 7 6 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

though there is no garrison within twelve miles, the horizon is 
immediately clouded with majors." 

"To take Macaulay out of literature and society, and put him in 
the House of Commons, is like taking the chief physician out of 
London during a pestilence." 

" How bored children are with the wisdom of Telcmachus ! they 
cant think why Calypso is so fond of him." 

Some one observing the wonderful improvement in since his 

success, "Ah!" he said, "praise is the best diet for us, after 
all." 

One day Mr Rogers took Mr Moore and my father home in his 
carriage, from a breakfast ; and insisted on showing them, by the 
way, Dryden's house, in some obscure street. It was very wet ; 
the house looked very much like other old houses ; and having 
thin shoes on, they both strongly remonstrated ; but in vain. 
Rogers got out himself, and stood expecting them to do likewise ; 
but my father, laughing and leaning out of the carriage, exclaimed, 
" Oh ! you see Avhy Rogers don't mind getting out, he has got 
goloshes on ; — but, my dear Rogers, lend us each a golosh, and we 
will then each stand on one leg, and admire as long as you please." 

"When Prescott comes to England, a Caspian Sea of soup 
awaits him." 

"An American said tome, 'You are so funny, Mr Smith! do 
you know you remind me of our great joker, Dr Chamberlaque.' 
1 1 am much honoured,' I replied, ' but I was not aware you had 
such a functionary in the United States.' " 

At Mr Romilly's there arose a discussion on the Inferno of Dante, 
and the tortures he had invented. " He may be a great poet," 
said my father, "but as to inventing tortures, I consider him a 
mere bungler, — no imagination, no knowledge of the human heart. 
If I had taken it in hand, I would show you what torture really 
was. For instance (turning, merrily, to his old friend Mrs 
Marcet), you should be doomed to listen, for a thousand years, to 
conversations between Caroline and Emily, where Caroline should 
always give wrong explanations in chemistry, and Emily in the end 
be unable to distinguish an acid from an alkali. You, Macaulay, 
let me consider?— oh, you should be dumb. False dates and facts 
of the reign of Queen Anne should for ever be shouted in your 
ears ; all liberal and honest opinions should be ridiculed in your 
presence ; and you should not be able to say a single word during 
that period in their defence." " And what would you condemn me 
to, Mr Sydney," said a young mother. " Why, you should for ever 
&ce those three sweet little girls of yours on the point of falling 
down-stairs, and never be able to save them. There, what tortures 
are there in Dante equal to these ?" 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 177 

• Daniel Webster struck me much like a steam-engine in 
trousers." 

" When I began to thump the cushion of my pulpit, on first 
coming to Foston, as is my wont when I preach, the accumulated 
dust of a hundred and fifty years made such a cloud, that for some 
minutes I lost sight of my congregation." 

" Nothing amuses me more than to observe the utter want of 
perception of a joke in some minds. Mrs Jackson called the other 
day, and spoke of the oppressive heat of last week. ' Heat, 
Ma'am V I said ; 'it was so dreadful here, that I found there was 
nothing left for it but to take off my flesh and sit in my bones.' 

* Take off your flesh and sit in your bones, Sir ? Oh, Mr Smith ! 
how could you do that ? ' she exclaimed, with the utmost gravity. 

* Nothing more easy, Ma'am : come and see next time.' But she 
ordered her carriage, and evidently thought it a very unorthodox 
proceeding." 

" Miss , too, the other day, walking round the grounds at 

Combe Florey, exclaimed, ' Oh, why do you chain up that fine 
Newfoundland dog, Mr Smith?' 'Because it has a passion for 
breakfasting on parish boys.' ( Parish boys ! ' she exclaimed, 
'does he really eat boys, Mr Smith?' 'Yes, he devours them, 
buttons and all.' Her face of horror made me die of laughing." 

A most curious instance of this slow perception of humour 
occurred once in Brook Street, w r here a gentleman of some rank 
dined at our house, with a large party, of which my father and Mr 
Luttrell formed a portion. My father was in high spirits, and in 
his happiest vein ; and much brilliant conversation passed around 

from Mr Luttrell and others. Mr sat through it all with the 

utmost gravity. This seemed only to stimulate my father, who 
became more and more brilliant, till the table was in a perfect 
roar of laughter. The servants even, forgetting all decorum, were 

obliged to turn away to conceal their mirth. Mr alone sat 

unmoved, and gazing with solemn wonder at the scene around. 

Luttrell was so struck by this that he said, " Mr was a 

natural phenomenon whom he must observe ; " so, letting the 
side-dishes pass by, he took out his eye-glass to watch. At last 
my father accidentally struck out a subject (which, for social 
reasons, I must not give, though it was inimitable), which touched 
the right spring, and he could resist no longer, but actually 
laughed out. Luttrell shouted victory in my ear ; and resumed 
his wonted attention to the dinner, saying, he had never witnessed 
so curious a scene. 

The conversation turned upon pictures. " I like pictures, without 
knowing anything about them ; but I hate coxcombry in the fine 
arts, as well as in anything else. I got into dreadful disgrace with 

M 



173 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Sir G. B. once, who, standing before a picture at Bowood, exclaimed, 
turning to me, ' Immense breadth of light and shade !' I innocently 
said, 'Yes; about an inch and a half. ; He gave me a look that 
ought to have killed me." 

At a large dinner-party my father, or some one else, announced 
the death of Mr Dugald Stewart, one whose name ever brings 
with it feelings of respect for his talents and high character. The 
news was received with so much levity by a lady of rank, who sat 
by him, that he turned round and said, " Madam, when we are told 
of the death of so great a man as Mr Dugald Stewart, it is usual, 
in civilised society, to look grave for at least the space of five 
seconds." 

" They do nothing in Ireland as they would elsewhere. When 
the Dublin mail was stopped and robbed, my brother declares that 
a sweet female voice was heard behind the hedge, exclaiming, 'Shoot 
the gintleman, then, Patrick dear ! '" 

We were all assembled to look at a turtle that had been sent to 
the house of a friend, when a child of the party stooped down and 
began eagerly stroking the shell of the turtle. " Why are you doing 

that, B ?" said my father. "Oh, to please the turtle." "Why 

child, you might as well stroke the dome of St Paul's, to please the 
Dean and Chapter." 

Some one naming as not very orthodox, "Oh," said my 

father, " accuse a man of being a Socinian, and it is all over with 
him ; for the country gentlemen all think it has something to do 
with poaching." 

" I hate bare walls ; so I cover mine, you see, with pictures, 
took the advice once of two Royal Academicians ; but brought 
their consultation to an abrupt termination by saying, Gentlemen, 
I forgot to mention that my highest price is five-and-thirty shillings. 
The public, it must be owned, treat my collection with great con- 
tempt ; and even Hibbert, who has been brought up in the midst 
of fine pictures, and might know better, never will admire them. 
But look at that sea-piece, now ; what would you desire more ? It 
is true, the moon in the corner was rather dingy when I first bought 
it ; so I had a new moon put in for half-a-crown, and now I consider 
it perfect." 

Of my father's conversation in London, where of course such 
powers were most excited and most brilliant (except in these slight 
specimens, principally furnished by the kindness of a friend), I have 
hardly attempted to give any idea ; partly because the documents 
that would best have enabled me to do so (his daily letters, when 
absent, to my mother) have not been preserved ; partly because of 
such journals so little can and ought to be published, that they serve 
but to remind one of Sancho Panza's feast, where a splendid list of 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. i 79 

names promises everything, and produces nothing; — and last, 
though not least, as his friend Lord John Russell observes, because 
it is hardly possible to describe his manner, or convey the slightest 
idea of what his powers really were, in their most brilliant moments, 
to those who have never witnessed them. Lord John adds, — and 
all who knew my father will agree with his conclusion, — that " in 
his peculiar style he has never been surpassed, and perhaps will not 
be equalled." I observe, with pleasure, that every sketch which 
has appeared of him has laid great stress upon the wonderful 
degree of truth, wisdom, and bold illustration, that was often con- 
cealed in these ludicrous pictures and apparent nonsense ; and 
which not only made them valuable, but prevented their ever 
palling, or degenerating into mere buffoonery. 

About this period began his contest with the Ecclesiastical 
Commission, which lasted nearly four years, and was carried on 
principally in a series of letters addressed to Archdeacon Singleton. 
In these letters, after touching slightly upon the injustice of forming 
such a Commission without any one to protect the interests of the 
inferior clergy — on the permanent and arbitrary powers granted to 
the Commission, under a Whig ministry — on the inclination the 
Commission evinced to appropriate the patronage, at the same 
time that they were claiming the honours of martyrdom (d ftropos 
to which he introduced the episode of the old chronicle of Dort, 
which had such extraordinary success) ; — touching on these, 
together with many other clauses very oppressive to the clergy 
(which were afterwards given up), he proceeds to enforce two 
principles. First, that if the laity desire an Establishment into 
which birth, wealth, station, talent, education, and character should 
flow ; and bestow on it a revenue which, if equally divided, would 
hardly place the clergy on a footing with the upper servants of a 
nobleman's family, and would not, according to the proposed plan 
of spoliation, be an addition of more than £$, 12s. 6%d. per man ; 
payment by hope, or inequality of division, were the only means 
of obtaining the desired end, and the prizes in the lottery must be 
left. Or, if the inequality in some instances was too great, the 
remedy should be applied where the greatest evil existed. Secondly, 
that the Commission, by attacking vested interests during the life- 
time of the incumbents, were not only guilty of great present injustice, 
but were admitting a most dangerous precedent, and overturning 
a principle that all governments had hitherto respected. 

These letters, which by many have been considered as evincing 
more talent than almost anything he has written, produced con- 
siderable effect at the time ; and the many private letters I possess, 
as well as the testimony of the public press, show that public opinion 
was strongly with him — that these measures were changes, but not 



i So MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

reforms — that they contributed nothing to the public good— and 
that they diminished nothing of the public hostility to the Church. 
How it terminated is well known. He concludes the controversy 
with this tribute to his old friend and opponent, Lord John Russell : 
— "You know very well, my dear Lord, in criticising parts of your 
Church reform, I mean nothing unkind or unfriendly to you per- 
sonally. I have known you for thirty years ; and I do not believe 
that in this country, full of good men, there is one more honest, 
upright, and intrepid than yourself." My father, I find, states that 
he has the most honourable testimony from Lord John himself, that 
in conducting this dispute he never exceeded the bounds of free 
discussion ; and that he was influenced by no motive that did not 
affect equally the whole body to which he belonged, and whose 
interests he felt bound to defend.* 

I am aware that these letters have afforded plausible ground for 
the insinuations that were made by some few, that my father, a 
Whig all his life, deserted his party, and attacked his friends ; and, 
a reformer, opposed reform the moment it affected his own interest. 
These are grave charges, but are best met by a few facts. He 
attacked the Whigs when they were in power, and had everything 
to bestow ; when they were poor and powerless, he was ever found 
fighting at their side. This does not look mean and base. He 
opposed not reform, but this reform ; and this reform he had 
opposed upon the same principle, twenty years before, in the Edin- 
burgh Review, under a Tory administration, when in his wildest 
dreams he had never hoped to be a Canon of St Paul's.t He did 
not, therefore, change his opinions with his position. It did not 
affect his personal interests, as he wanted the patronage neither for 
himself nor his family ; and the noble use he made of valuable 
patronage when it did come into his hands, must sufficiently 
exonerate him from the suspicion of acting from interested motives 
in the eyes of any candid man. 

The following petition from the Rev. Sydney Smith, was pre- 
sented and read to the House of Lords by the Honourable the 
Lord Bishop of Rochester, July 1840 : — 

* I might add to this statement, that I have very lately received from Lord John 
Russell the most generous praise of these very letters (always excepting a well-known 
passage, which he considered unjust) ; and Lord John's last act has indeed so proved its 
injustice, that I feel sure my father, were he alive, would be the first to retract it, and 
to do honour to the sacrifice that has been made by his friend. 

t There is also amongst his papers an amusing fragment on the subject of tithes, 
written about the period that question was being discussed, which, as it is but a frag- 
ment is hardly worth inserting. But in this again he speaks strongly of the necessity 
of inequality of payment, in order to support an Establishment so ill provided for as the 
Church of England ; showing still further how consistent he was from first to last in his 
©pinions on this subject as well as others, 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. i8r 



" To the Right Honourable the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in 
Parliament assembled. 

" The humble petition of the Rev. Sydney Smith, Canon Resi- 
dentiary of St Paul's, humbly showeth, — That your petitioner has 
bestowed considerable thought and attention upon the subject of 
the Ecclesiastical Duties and Revenues Bill, and prays that the 
same may not pass into a law ; for the following reasons : — 

" The Bill applies to the spiritual destitution of the Church, that 
which was left for the ornaments and rewards of the Church ; and 
in this way gets rid of the burden of supporting the clergy, by 
tampering with the sacred laws of property ; making, at the same 
time, the multitude believe that they are reforming abuses, while 
they are only evading duties and weakening principles. 

" By lessening the rewards of the Church, it prevents men of 
capital from entering into it ; and makes the whole wealth of those 
who are engaged in the service of the Church less, instead of in- 
creasing it. 

" The whole mass of property which the Bill proposes to confis- 
cate, will make the poor clergy a very little less poor, while its con- 
fiscation destroys the powerful stimulus of hope at the beginning 
of an ecclesiastical life. Two-thirds of the present deans and pre- 
bendaries have been curates and small vicars : they would, at the 
lowest period of their fortunes, have refused to barter their hope of 
fature competence for the addition of a few pounds to their income ; 
and this is most unquestionably the state of feeling among the lower 
clergy at the present moment. 

" The whole of the Bill supposes that deans and chapters have 
made a worse use of their patronage than bishops, and this is 
directly contrary to truth. But what is true of this Bill is, that one 
order in the Church, who have no votes in Parliament, have been 
completely sacrificed to those who have votes, — that deans and 
prebendaries, carefully excluded from the Commission, have been 
condemned to confiscation, — and that the Prelate-Commissioners 
have not sacrificed one shilling of the aggregate income of the 
bishops to those spiritual destitutions of the Church, which they 
feel so strongly, but relieve with property not their own. 

" The Bill destroys many ecclesiastical offices, which, with a 
little care and thought, might have been made eminently useful to 
literature ; to the present plans of national education ; to the care 
of dioceses in the decay and old age of bishops ; and to the general 
support of episcopal authority ; or, what is of more importance (in 
the present unrepresented and unsupported state of the parochial 
clergy), to the checks upon episcopal authority. 

" This Bill habituates the Legislature to the easy and inviting 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

power o( tampering with the property of the Church. It is utterly 
impossible to believe that this will be the last and the worst act of 
that nature. 

"The law, as it now stands, enables dignified clergymen to bestow 
their patronage on their children and relations, who may be deserv- 
ing of it. Under this sanction they have given to their sons very 
expensive educations at the universities. The present Bill destroys 
these expectations ; sets at nought vested rights ; and, instead of 
applying this provision to future members of chapters, cuts off from 
their rights the ancient members of those bodies, who have laid 
out their whole plan of life upon the faithof laws unimpugned and 
unrepealed for centuries ; and this appears to your petitioner 
to be a gross act of spoliation and injustice, and contrary to the 
express provisions and arrangements of the Commissioners them- 
selves. 

" To give to every clergyman who has gone through the expense 
of an English university, and who is married and settled in the 
country, the income which they ought in decency and in justice to 
receive, would require, not only the confiscation of all the cathedral 
and episcopal property, but some millions of money in addition. 
A Church provided for as ours now is, can obtain a well-educated 
and respectable clergy only by those hopes which are excited by 
the unequal division and lottery of preferment. This is the real 
cause which has brought capital and respectability into the English 
Church, and peopled it with the well-educated sons of gentlemen, 
— an object of the greatest importance in a rich country like Eng- 
land. Nothing would so rapidly and certainly ensure the degra- 
dation of the Church of England, as the equal division of all its 
revenues among all its members. 

" For these reasons, your petitioner believes the Bill in question 
(however well intended) to be founded on a very short-sighted 
policy, and that it will entail great evils upon a Church no longer 
unfavourable to the civil liberties of mankind — as yet untainted by 
fanaticism — carried forward by the labours of a highly-improved 
clergy — and now become as useful and as active as any church 
establishment which the world has yet seen. 

" This, as it seems to your petitioner, is the last of all our insti- 
tutions upon which an experiment so daring and so dangerous 
ought to be tried. For these reasons, your petitioner humbly 
prays that the Ecclesiastical Duties and Revenues Bill may not 
pass into a law. 

" Sydney Smith." 



In the previous year, 1839, a statue having been erected at New- 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 183 

castle, in honour of Earl Grey, my father was requested to write 
the inscription for it. He sent the following ; but as it did not 
entirely meet the views of all the subscribers, it was not adopted ; 
though I have reason to believe it was much appoved of by the 
family : — 

TO CHARLES, EARL GREY, K.G., 

OF HOWICK, IN NORTHUMBERLAND, 

THIS MONUMENT, 

IN A SPIRIT OF SOLEMN RESPECT 

AND DEEP GRATITUDE, 

IS ERECTED, BY MANY OF HIS FELLOW-CITIZENS. 

THEY HAVE SEEN HIM THROUGH A LONG LIFE 

DEDICATING HIS FINE TALENTS TO PROMOTE THE BEST INTERESTS 

OF MANKIND, 

AND, IN EVIL DAYS, WITH HIGH MORAL COURAGE, 

DEFENDING THE ALMOST EXTINGUISHED LIBERTIES OF ENGLAND. 

THEY OWE TO HIM THAT MEMORABLE REFORM, 

WHICH, BLENDING FREEDOM WITH LOYALTY AND ORDER, 

HAS INFUSED FRESH LIFE AND ENERGY INTO ALL 

OUR INSTITUTIONS ; 

A REFORM WHICH HE PLANNED IN HIS YOUTH, 

AND BROUGHT TO TRIUMPHANT PERFECTION IN HIS ADVANCED AGE. 

REMEMBERING THESE THINGS, 

THEY HAVE DEEMED IT AN ACT OF SACRED JUSTICE 

TO RECORD, BY A PUBLIC MONUMENT, 

THEIR ADMIRATION OF THIS GREAT STATESMAN 5 

NOT WITHOUT HOPE 

THAT THE YOUNG, SEEING WHAT THOSE QUALITIES ARE 

WHICH COMMAND THE GRATITUDE OF MANKIND, 

MAY STRIVE TO BE AS GOOD AND PURE AS HE 

WHOSE IMAGE IS HERE PLACED BEFORE THEIR EYES. 

In the course of the same year, 1839, he likewise collected and 
published the greater part of his contributions in the Edinburgh 
Review, together with " Peter Plymley," which he had not hitherto 
acknowledged, and he says, on doing so : — " I see very little in my 
reviews to alter or repent of. I always endeavoured to fight against 
evil, and what I thought evil then I think evil now. I am heartily 
glad that all our disqualifying laws for religious opinions are 
abolished, and I see nothing in such measures but unmixed good 
and real increase of strength to the Establishment. To set on foot 
such a journal in such times, to contribute towards it for many 
years, to bear patiently the reproach and poverty which it caused, 
and to look back and see that I have nothing to retract, and no 
intemperance and violence to reproach myself with, is a career of 
life which I must think to be extremely fortunate. 



1 84 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

"Strange and ludicrous are the changes in human affairs ! The 
Tories are now on the treadmill, and the well-paid Whigs are riding 
in chariots ; with many faces, however, looking out of the windows 
(including that of our Prime Minister), which I never remember to 
have seen in the days of poverty and depression of Whiggism. 
Liberality is now a lucrative business. Whoever has any institu- 
tion to destroy, may consider himself as a commissioner, and his 
fortune made ; and, to my utter and never-ending astonishment, I, 
an old Edinburgh Reviewer, find myself fighting, in the year 1839, 
against the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London 
for the existence of the National Church." 



CHAPTER X. 

Vi?it to Combe Florey— Kindness to Grandchildren— Sudden Wealth — Recollections of 
his Parishioners at Foston— Death of Lord Holland : His Portrait— Letter to Mr 
Webster — Sketch of Revue des Deux Mondes — Letter of Mr Grenville — Visit from 
Mr Moore, and Verses — Bestows the Living of Edmonton on Mr Tate's Son — Letter 
to Mrs Sydney Smith— Address of Parishioners, and Answer — Letter of Mrs Marcet 
— Recipe for making Every Day Happy — Definition of Happiness — Petition to the 
American Congress in 1843 — Effects— Speech from Mr Ticknor — Letter from Mr 
Wainwright — Abuse and Gifts from America — Effect of Preaching in Old Age — 
Letter of Miss Edgeworth — Correspondence with Sir R. Peel — Extract from Journal, 
with Anecdotes. 

In the summer of 1839 we went again to spend some months with 
my father at Combe Florey, which every year became more beauti- 
ful under his fostering care. His love of children I have before 
alluded to, and particularly of his little grandchildren, whose hap- 
piness he delighted to promote. He hardly overdressed in a morn- 
ing without having them round him to assist him, or to play at 
shaving his table with his shaving-brush and huge wooden bowl, 
which still remained, though the reign of Bunch had ceased. 
Amongst these grandchildren was an odd, clever little girl, about 
five years old, who amused him much by her peculiarities ; one of 
which was, that she insisted upon understanding everything she 
heard, and that when baffled, as she often necessarily was, she 
took to roaring and kicking. On one of these occasions, my father 
was walking round his garden with his two arms swung behind 
over his black crutch-stick (his usual manner of walking), and hear- 
ing these sounds from his merry little favourite, he stopped under 
the open window, and called out, "What is the matter with my 
little girl ? " " Oh," said her mother, " she cannot understand 
something about the Hebrews. I have tried to explain it to her ; 
but as she has lost her temper, I have told her she must wait till 
she is older." He looked excessively amused at the mental am- 
bition of the little five-years-old, but walked off in silence. Two 
hours after, the mother found him closeted with the youthful cul- 
prit in his favourite library, sitting in his large arm-chair, with the 
child on his knee, with maps, dictionary, and books piled around 
him, he explaining and she listening with apparently equal 
pleasure, till the difficulty was overcome, and the child satisfied. 
I must add, in justice to the little girl, that though she has retained 



1 86 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

her love of investigation, she has fortunately left off the habit of 
roaring" and kicking under mental difficulties. 

The sudden death of his youngest brother, Courtenay, about this 
time (whose debt of thirty pounds my father had paid with so much 
difficulty at college fifty years before), without a will, put my father 
in possession of the third part of the very large, but to himself 
useless, fortune, which Courtenay had accumulated in India ; and 
thus, as my father has said, "in my grand climacteric I became, 
unexpectedly a rich man." Having the means of spending now, 
he spent as liberally as if he had been used to wealth all his life ; 
for his rigid economy in poverty had never the effect of making 
him penurious. 

In the summer of 1840, when travelling through Yorkshire, I 
went with my children to see our old haunts at Foston ; and it was 
very gratifying to find, though nearly ten years had elapsed since 
he left them, how fresh my father's memory still was in the hearts 
of his villagers. From almost every cottage some one came out to 
greet me, and to remind me of some saying, or some act of kind- 
ness, or to show me his parting gift, or to remember how he " doc- 
tored " them, and to lament his loss. And as to old Molly Mills, 
who was still alive, it was quite affecting to see the mixture of joy 
and sorrow in her face, as she recalled old stories, or thought of her 
present loss, — " the smile on her lip, and the tear in her eye," — as 
she stood talking to me at her cottage-door. I felt these were hum- 
ble, but not the less precious tributes to his character. 

Each year now thinned the ranks of the great men with whom 
he had begun life ; men not only endeared to. him by social inter- 
course, but by that deep interest which a struggle for the same 
cause during so many years usually inspires. But amongst these 
losses, none ever fell more deeply and heavily on his heart than 
that of Lord Holland. He loved him, as indeed all did who had 
the privilege of knowing him intimately ; and he felt deeply his 
debt of gratitude to him in early life. Lord Holland's last illness 
was, I believe, short ; and on his dressing-table were found these 
few lines, which were sent to me by his sister, Miss Fox, after his 
death : — 

" Nephew of Fox, and friend of Grey, — 
Enough my meed of fame 
If those who deign'd to observe me say 
I injured neither name." 



In a letter to Mrs M , one of our oldest friends, he says, 

speaking of Lord Holland's death, — " It is indeed a great loss to 
me ; but I have learned to live, as a soldier does in war, expecting 
that on anv one moment the best and the dearest may be killed 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 187 

before his eyes. ... I have gout, asthma, and seven other mala- 
dies, but am otherwise very well." 

I see amongst my father's papers a sketch of Lord Holland, 
from which I shall make some extracts, as, I trust, they can only 
give pleasure. 

"A Portrait. 

" Great powers of reasoning, great quickness and ingenuity of 
proof, and a memory in the highest degree retentive ; a knowledge 
varied and extensive, and in English history and constitutional law 
profound. . . An invincible hatred of tyranny and oppression, 
the most ardent love of public happiness, and attachment to public 
rights. His conversation was lively and incessant. . . . 

" As a speaker, he wanted words, which he was often forced to 
stop for ; and he was too slow ; but he atoned for these defects by 
sense, knowledge, simplicity, logic, vehemence, and unblemished 
character. There never existed in any human being a better heart, 
or one more purified from all the bad passions, more abounding in 
charity and compassion, or which seemed to be so created as a re- 
fuge to the helpless and the oppressed. 

" He was very acute in the discernment of character ; more so, I 
cannot help thinking, than any public man of his time whom it has 
fallen to my lot to observe. He was one of the most consistent and 
steady politicians living in any day ; in whose life, exceeding sixty- 
five years, there was no doubt, varying, nor shadow of change. It 
was one great, incessant, and unrewarded effort to resist oppression, 
promote justice, and restrain the abuse of power." 



When Mr Webster was Secretary of Foreign Affairs for the 
United States, my father heard it reported from America that an 
accidental mistake he had made, in introducing Mr Webster, on his 
coming to this country some time before (I believe, to Lord 
Brougham) under the name of Mr Clay, was intentional, and by 
way of joke. Annoyed that so much impertinence and bad taste 
should be imputed to him, he wrote a few lines of explanation to 
Mr Webster, to which he received the following answer : — 

" Washington, 1841. 

" My dear Sir, 

" Though exceedingly delighted to hear from you, I am yet much 

pained by the contents of your note ; not so much however as I 

should be, were I not able to give a peremptory denial to the whole 

report. I never mentioned the incident to which you refer, as a 



183 MEMOIR OE THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH 

joke of yours, — far from it ; nor did I mention it as anything extra- 
ordinary. 

" My dear, good friend, do not think me such a — — as to 
quote or refer to any incident falling out between you and me to 
your disadvantage. The pleasure of your acquaintance is one ot 
the jewels I brought home with me. I had read of you, and read 
you, for thirty years. I was delighted to meet you, and to have all 
I knew of you refreshed and brightened by the charms of your con- 
versation. If any son of asserts that, either through ill-will, or 

love of vulgar gossip, I tell such things of you as you suppose, I 
pray you let him be knocked down instanter. And be assured, my 
dear Sir, I never spoke of you in my life but with gratitude, respect, 
and attachment. 

" D. Webster." 

My fatner wrote in answer : — 

" Many thanks, my dear Sir, for your obliging letter. I think 
better of myself because you think well of me. If, in the imbecility 
of old age, I forgot your name for a moment, the history of America 
will hereafter be more tenacious in its recollections ; tenacious, 
because you are using your eloquent wisdom to restrain the high 
spirit of your countrymen within the limits of justice, and are 
securing to two kindred nations, who ought to admire and benefit 
each other, the blessings of peace. How can great talents be ap- 
plied to nobler ends, or what existence can be more truly splendid? 

" Ever sincerely yours, 

" Sydney Smith." 



I have mentioned that my father, for reasons already given, had 
made a collection of his writings in the Edinburgh Review and 
elsewhere ; and retracted what little he felt he had been led by 
party prejudice to say unjustly ; and I cannot resist inserting here 
a short passage from a French review (I believe, the ' Revue des 
Deux Mondes '), because I think it is a trait in his character that 
has been unnoticed by his countrymen. 

" Quoi de plus frequent que de se dire, au fond du cceur, j'ai 6t6 
trop loin — ceci n'etait pas vrai, ceci e'tait injuste? mais quoi de plus 
rare que de l'imprimer ? Voila ce que Sydney a noblement fait : 
trente ans apres ses regards rencontrent une plaisanterie qu'un juge 
moins severe de ses propres fautes aurait pu croire innocente, il ne 
peut s'empecher de dire, ' II n'y a rien qui depare plus les lettres de 
Plymley que cette attaque dirige'e contre M. Bourne, qui est une 
personne d'honneur et de talent ; mais viola ou menent les mau- 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 189 

vaises passions de Fesprit de parti.' Castlereagh n'dtait pas an 
horame venal, cependant il Vavait reprdsente' comme capable de 
recevoir de toutes mains ; ' Je l'ai injustement accuse^' avoue-t-il 
franchement. II est beau d'entendre de la sorte un mot fameux, et 
de reconnaitre, en se condamnant soi-meme, qu'on doit surtout la 
verite a son ennemi mort." 

He sent a copy of his works to each 01" my children in 1842, as 
the best memorial of himself that he could give them : alas ! in how 
few years was it the only memorial left. 

I find among the papers left me a pretty letter from his old friend 
Mr Grenville, to whom my father had sent what he believed to be 
a rare and valuable edition of Lucan, which we had found amongst 
his books. The following is an extract from it : — 

" My dear Sir, 
" Lucan was first printed in 1469 ; but although, under these cir- 
cumstances, Aldus of 1 5 15 may not be highly estimated in biblio- 
graphical reputation, still it comes to me with all the value of a 
unique copy ; for I know nobody, else who would have so disposed 
of a book with a perfect indifference to its being worth one hundred 
pounds or one hundred pence, but with an evident wish that it 
might turn out to be ranked under the first of these two classes. 
Most gladly and gratefully therefore shall Lucan, 15 15, repose upon 
my shelves, with the unique distinction which I am proud to at- 
tribute to it from its highly-valued donor. 

" Ever most truly yours, 

" Thomas Grenville." 

In the summer of 1843 we had a visit from Mr Moore, a visit 
often promised, but never before accomplished. The weather and 
the place were lovely, and seemed to inspire the charming little 
poet, who talked and sang in his peculiar fashion, like any nightin- 
gale of the Flowery Valley, to the delight of us all. In true poet 
style, when he departed, he left various articles of his wardrobe 
scattered about. On my father writing to inform him of this, he 
sent the following answer : — 

"Sloperton, 1843. 
" My dear Sydney, 
" Your lively letter (what else could it be ?) was found by me 
here on my return from Bowood ; and with it a shoal of other 
letters, which it has taken me almost ever since to answer. I began 
my answer to yours in rhyme, contrasting the recollections I had 
brought away from you, with the sort of treasures you had supposed 
me to have left behind. This is part of it : — 



190 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITJHT. 

" Rev. Sir, having duly received by the post 
Your list of the articles missing and lost 
By a certain small poet, well known on the road, 
Who visited lately your flowery abode ; 

We have balanced what Hume calls ' the tottle o' the whole? 
Making all due allowance for what the bard stole ; 
And hoping th' enclosed will be found quite correct, 
Have the honour, Rev. Sir, to be yours with respect. 

" Left behind a kid glove, once the half of a pair, 
An odd stocking, whose fellow i:; — Heaven knows where ; 
And (to match these odd fellows) a couplet sublime, 
Wanting nought to complete it but reason and rhyme. 

" Such, it seems, are the only small goods you can find, 
That this runaway bard in his flight left behind; 
But in settling the account, just remember, I pray, 
What rich recollections the rogue took away ; 
What visions for ever of sunny Combe Florey, 
Its cradle of hills, where it slumbers in glory, 
Its Sydney himself, and the countless bright things 
Which his tongue or his pen, from the deep shining springs 
Of his wisdom and wit, ever flowingly brings. 

" I have not time to recollect any more ; besides, I was getting 
rather out of my depth in those deep shining springs, though not 
out of yours. Kindest regards to the ladies, not forgetting the 
pretty Hebe * of the breakfast-table the day I came away. 

" Yours ever most truly, 

" Thomas Moore." 

" Bowood, August, Tuesday 22, 1843. 
"My dear Sydney, 
"You said, in your acknowledgment of my late versicles, that 
you had never been be-rhymed before. This startled me into the 
recollection that I had myself once before made free with you in 
that way ; but where the evidence was of my presumption, I could 
not remember. The verses, however, written some three or four 
years ago, have just turned up, and here they are for you. I forgot, 
by the by, to tell you that, a day or two after my return from 
Combe Florey (/ like to write that name), I was persuaded to get 
into a gig with Lady Kerry, and let her drive me some miles. Next 
day I found out that, but a day or two before, it had run away with 
her ! — no bad taste, certainly, in the horse ; — but it shows what one 
gets by consorting with young countesses and frisky ecclesiastics, t 

" Yours ever, 

" Thomas Moore." 

'* And still let us laugh, preach the world as it may, 

Where the cream of the joke is, the swarm will soon follow ', 

* Sir Henry Holland's youngest daughter. 

t Mr Smith had driven Mr Moore with a somewhat frisky horse. Mr Moore got out 
of the gig, and walked home. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 191 

Heroics are very fine things in their way, 
But the laugh, at the long-run, will carry it hollow. 

' Yes, Jocus ! gay god, whom the Gentiles supplied, 

And whose worship not even among Christians declines ; 
In our senates thou'st languish'd, since Sheridan died, 
But Sydney still keeps thee alive in our shrines. 

" Rare Sydney ! thrice honour'd the stall where he sits, 
And be his every honour he dcigneth to climb at 1 
Had England a hierarchy form'd all of wits, 
Whom, but Sydney, would England proclaim as its primate? 

" And long may he flourish, frank, merry, and brave, 
A Horace to feast with, a Pascal * to read I 
While he laughs, all is safe J but, when Sydney grows grave, 
We shall then think the Church is in danger indeed." 



About this time the very valuable living of Edmonton fell vacant, 
by the death of my father's fellow- canon, Mr Tate ; and by the rules 
of the Chapter of St Paul's, it lay with my father either to take it 
himself or present it to a relation or friend. Remembering the 
honest intrepidity of his old colleague, who, in spite of poverty and 
many children, had many years before joined him in a minority of 
two against the clergy of Yorkshire, under a Tory administration, 
in favour of Catholic Emancipation, and grieving at the poverty 
his family would be reduced to by his death, he determined to be- 
stow the living on his eldest son, who had acted as his father's 
curate, if he found on inquiry that he was fitted for it by his char- 
acter. He has given a most touching account of his interview with 
the unhappy widow and her family on this occasion, in a letter to 
my mother, from which I shall give some extracts. 

'* Green Street, October 23. 
" Dearest Kate, 
" I meant to have gone to Munden to-day, but am not quite stout, 
so have postponed my journey there till next Saturday, the 28th. 
I went over yesterday to the Tates, at Edmonton. The family con- 
sists of three delicate daughters, an aunt, the old lady, and her son, 
then curate of Edmonton ; the old lady was in bed. I found there 
a physician, an old friend of Tate's, attending them from friendship, 
who had come from London for that purpose. They were in daily 
expectation of being turned out from house and curacy. ... I be- 
gan by inquiring the character of their servant ; then turned the 
conversation upon their affairs, and expressed a hope the Chapter 
might ultimately do something for them. I then said, ' It is my duty 

* " Some parts of the ' Provinciales ' may be said to be of the highest order of jeux 
<?esj>rit."—Note by Mr Moore 



i 9 2 MEMi. 

to state to you' (they were all assembled) 'that I have given away 
the living of Edmonton ; and have written to our Chapter clerk 
this morning, to mention the person to whom I have given it j and 
I must also tell you, that I am sure he will appoint his curate.' (A 
general silence and dejection.) 'It is a very odd coincidence/ I 
added, ' that the gentleman I have selected is a namesake of this 
family ; his name is Tate. Have you any relations of that name ? ; 
' No, we have not.' ' And, by a more singular coincidence, his 
name is Thomas Tate ; in short,' I added, ' there is no use in mincing 
the matter, you are vicar of Edmonton.' They all burst into tears. 
It flung me also into a great agitation of tears, and I wept and 
groaned for a long time. Then I rose and said I thought it was 
very likely to end in their keeping a buggy, at which we all 
laughed as violently. 

" The poor old lady, who was sleeping in a garret because she 
could not bear to enter into the room lately inhabited by her 
husband, sent for me and kissed me, sobbing with a thousand emo- 
tions. The charitable physician wept too. ... I never passed so 
remarkable a morning, nor was more deeply impressed with the 
sufferings of human life, and never felt more thoroughly the happi- 
ness of doing good. 

" God bless you ! 

" Sydney Smith." 

On this act becoming known, my father received an address from 
the principal parishioners of Edmonton, stating that they had in- 
tended to address the Dean and Chapter, respectfully soliciting 
their patronage in favour of the son of their late vicar, and adding : 
" But what shall we say, Reverend Sir, of that munificent act of 
liberality on your part, by which the necessity of such a memorial 
is superseded ? Though however that necessity is superseded, we 
feel, Reverend Sir, bound in gratitude to present to you personally 
our united thanks, for the great benefit you have bestowed on our 
parish, and the high gratification you have afforded us." To which 
my father replied : — 

" Gentlemen, 
" I am very much pleased by the address you have done me the 
honour to send me. . . . In the choice of a clergyman for the parish 
of Edmonton I was actuated by many considerations. I had to 
consult the character and dignity of the Chapter, which would have 
been compromised by the nomination of a person merely because 
he was my friend and relation. I was to find a serious and dili- 
gent man, in the prime of life, able and eager to fulfil the burden- 
some duties of so large a parish ; and I was to seek in him those 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 193 

characters of gentleness and peace which are of such infinite im- 
portance to the character of the Church, and the happiness of those 
who live under the beautiful influence of these qualities. Lastly, I 
had to show my strong respect for the memory of one of the kindest 
and best men that ever lived ; and to lift up, if I could, from poverty 
and despair, his widow and his children. 

" The address I have the honour to receive from you to-day con- 
vinces me that I have succeeded in combining these objects ; and 
makes me really happy in thinking that my conduct has obtained 
the approbation of so many honourable men, so well acquainted 
with the circumstances of the case. 

" I am, Gentlemen, with great respect, 

" Your obedient humble servant, 

" Sydney Smith." 

I must add a touching little note from his old friend Mrs Marcet, 
to my mother, on this occasion : — 

" What a happy woman you must be, my dear Mrs Smith, to 
have such a husband ! All the world know his talents, but it is 
not many who know that heart, so overflowing with generous and 
magnanimous feelings, with tender mercies, and Christian charities. 
God bless him ! , , * I will write it, though it makes my hand ache ; * 
it fills my heart with joy, and my eyes with tears. 

" Ever affectionately yours, 

" J. Marcet." 

The following letter was very kindly sent to me by the Bishop of 
London, from which I give extracts : — 

" My dear Lord, 
" I am very glad you approve of my choice. Every one of the 
persons who have pews in his church have concurred in the same 
sentiment, as I learn from a memorial sent to me to that effect. I 
never saw a greater scene of distress than when I went down to 
them ; the poor mother ill in bed of a fever, three delicate sisters, 
a poor and aged aunt, and the curate— all expecting to be turned 
out of house and curacy, with ^100 per annum between them all. 
The transition from despair to joy was awful ; I shall never forget 
it. . . . Have mercy, my dear Lord, and take ^100 ; f it leaves 
only .£700 per annum to the Vicar of Edmonton and his brothers ; 
this will make W— Hill equal to Southgate, where the curacy is 
made up ^200 per annum. 

" Yours, my dear Lord, very sincerely, 

" Sydney Smith." 

* Mrs Marcet had sprained her wrist. 

t The Bishop of London had wished to divide the living. 

N 



i 9 4 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

\X is beautifully said somewhere :— " Happiness is what all men 

seek ; all men have the jewel in their casket, but how few find the 

> open it ! " The following paragraph, which, I find my 

mother says, "was cut out of our papers and preserved by Sydney," 

shows at least that he had not sought for the key quite in vain. 

" Recipe for making every Day Happy. 
u When you rise in the morning, form a resolution to make the 
day a happy one to a fellow-creature. It is easily done ; — a left-off 
garment to the man who needs it, a kind word to the sorrowful, an 
encouraging expression to the striving ; trifles in themselves light 
as air will do it, at least for the twenty-four hours ; and, if you are 
young, depend upon it it will tell when you are old ; and, if you are 
old, rest assured it will send you gently and happily down the stream 
of human time to eternity. By the most simple arithmetical sum, 
look at the result : you send one person, only one, happily through 
the day ; that is three hundred and sixty-five in the course of the 
year j and supposing you live forty years only after you commence 
that course of medicine, you have made 14,600 human beings 
happy, at all events for a time. Now, worthy reader, is this not 
simple? It-is too short for a sermon, too homely for ethics, and 
too easily accomplished for you to say, ' I would if I could.' " 

I know that my mother thought her husband's life the best com- 
ment on these precepts. I see amongst his scattered notes on this 
subject, "The haunts of happiness are varied, and rather unacount- 
able ; but I have more often seen her among little children, home 
firesides, and country houses, than anywhere else; at least I 
think so." 

On his return to Combe Florey, in July, he spent a few days at 
Nuneham, on a visit to his former diocesan, the Archbishop of 
York. He met there a large and agreeable party ; and a discussion 
arising, amongst other subjects, on hardness of character, my 
father, at the request of Miss G. Harcourt, wrote the following 
definition of it. 

" Definition of Hardness of Character. 

" Hardness is a want of minute attention to the feelings of others. 
It does not proceed from malignity or a carelessness of inflicting 
pain, but from a want of delicate perception of those little things 
by which pleasure is conferred or pain excited. 

" A hard person thinks he has done enough if he does not speak 
ill of your relations, your children, or your country ; and then, with 
the greatest good-humour and volubility, and with a total inatten- 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 195 

tion to your individual state and position, gallops over a thousand 
fine feelings, and leaves in every step the mark of his hoofs upon 
your heart. Analyse the conversation of a well-bred man who is 
clear of the besetting sin of hardness ; it is a perpetual homage of 
polite good-nature. He remembers that you arc connected with 
the Church, and he avoids (whatever his opinions maybe) the most 
distant reflections on the Establishment. He knows that you are 
admired, and he admires you as far as is compatible with good- 
breeding. He sees that, though young, you are at the head of a 
great establishment, and he infuses into his manner and conver- 
sation that respect which is so pleasing to all who exercise au- 
thority. He leaves you in perfect good-humour with yourself, 
because you perceive how much and how successfully you have 
,been studied. 

"In the meantime the gentleman on the other side of you (a 
highly moral and respectable man) has been crushing little sensi- 
bilities, and violating little proprieties, and overlooking little dis- 
criminations ; and without violating anything which can be called 
a rule, or committing what can be denominated a fault, has dis- 
pleased and dispirited you, from wanting that fine vision which 
sees little things, and that delicate touch which handles them, and 
that fine sympathy which the superior moral organisation always 
bestows. 

"So great an evil in society is hardness, and that want of per- 
ception of the minute circumstances which occasion pleasure or 
pain." 

Towards the end of this year (1843) m Y father sent a petition to 
the American Congress, for payment of the debt due to England by 
the repudiating States. 

It was said of Regnault St Jean d' Angely, President of the French 
Institute, " qu'il avait passe la vie en venant toujours au secours 
du plus fort." The reverse might justly be said of my father : he 
passed his life in minorities, and in the cause of the oppressed. 
He says, in speaking of his motives for undertaking the one in 
question : " I am no enemy to America ; I loved and admired 
honest America when she respected the laws of pounds, shillings, 
and pence, and I thought the United States the most magnificent 
picture of human happiness. I meddle now in these matters be- 
cause I hate fraud ; because I pity the misery it has occasioned ; 
because I mourn over the hatred it has excited against free institu- 
tions." 

This petition and the letters which followed it produced a most 
extraordinary sensation, and brought upon him much abuse from 
the American press ; though we had reason to believe, from many 



iq6 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

sources, that they spoke the feelings of every honourable man in 
America. 

" And all this storm," says the editor of the "Morning Chronicle" 
of the time, " has been raised by a few words from a private English 
gentleman ! Why is it that his words have had such a talismanic 
effect? It is true, they were words of choice and singular excel- 
lence ; but no mastery of language or weight of literary reputation 
could so have moved America, if they did not happen to be 
employed in the utterance of home truths, which are, or ought to 
be, sharper than a two-edged sword. We repeat, that the power 
of these letters lies mainly in the deep moral feeling that pervades 
them : and one proof of this is, the warm response they have called 
forth from those in America in whom the moral sense is strong 
enough to make them speak out." 

As one specimen of this, I shall insert a speech or letter of Mr 
Ticknor's, extracted from the " Boston Semi-weekly Advertiser," 
and sent to my father by Mr Everett. 

" The short and pungent petition to Congress of the Rev. Sydney 
Smith, in relation to his claim on the state of Pennsylvania, for 
interest-money due to him, has already excited no little remark 
among us, and is likely to excite yet more. This is probably one 
of the effects its author intended it should produce ; perhaps it is 
one of the effects that we ourselves, as honest men and patriots, 
ought to desire ; for the subject of his petition is a grave one, that 
cannot excite too much discussion in any part of the United 
States. But we should be careful, for our own sakes, to assume 
the right tone when speaking of a man like Mr Smith, who only 
asks to be paid that to which he is as justly entitled as any one of 
us is entitled to anything he possesses. 

" It has therefore appeared to many persons unseemly that the 
' Boston Courier ' should speak of Mr Smith's petition, to have 
payment made to him of the interest, which has been solemnly pro- 
mised on the faith and honour of the State of Pennsylvania, merely 
as ' impudence, bombast, and impertinence.' The claims of a 
creditor are not always welcome to his debtor, and, when other 
means have failed, they are not always set forth by the injured party 
in the most civil and gracious words ; writs and executions, for 
instance, are not drawn up in terms chosen for the sake of pleasing 
1 ears polite.' Mr Smith would, no doubt, have much preferred to 
use the good set terms of these instruments of established author- 
ity ; and nobody would then have fancied he was doing anything 
unreasonable, since he would be doing just what everybody else 
does who cannot in other ways get his rights. But the great and 
rich State of Pennsylvania, like the other States of our Union, has 
taken some pains to place herself above the reach of such vulgar 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



197 



processes for coercing her to be honest. She cannot be sued : her 
creditor therefore is compelled to use his own words, instead of 
the more stringent words of the law. No doubt Mr Sydney Smith, 
when doing this, does not present himself with a very cringing air: 
he uses strong phrases, stronger than we like to hear, stronger than 
is respectful ; but the real difficulty in the case is, that the strongest 
words he uses are true words ; for just so long as the Pennsyl- 
vanians refuse to lay a tax of one cent on every hundred dollars of 
their wealth to pay their honest debts, just so long they may be 
called ' men who prefer any load of infamy, however great, to any 
pressure of taxation, however light ; ' and this is the hardest and 
sharpest phrase in Mr Smith's petition. To be sure, it would not 
be easy, on the same subject, to say anything more cutting or 
more terse ; but, after all, the bitterness of the words lies in their 
truth. 

"The 'New York Evening Post' is more severe on Mr Smith 
than the ' Boston Courier.' His petition is there treated as the 
'ravings of one who had been disappointed in reaping that profit 
from his speculations which he expected and desired ; ' and because 
he has told us that we are ' unstable in the very foundations of 
social life/ the writer in the ' Post ' inquires, whether ' the Bible 
used by the reverend gentleman teaches him that dollars and cents 
are the very foundation of social life 1 ' Now, it is disagreeable to 
witness such injustice coupled with such violence of language ; the 
thing is wrong in itself, and it does us much harm. The Rev. 
Sydney Smith is no more a speculator than every man is who lends 
money to his neighbour at the regular rate of interest ; nor does he 
rave any more than every man raves, who insists, in round terms, 
that he will be paid what is plainly and lawfully due to him. Then, 
too, as to the ' foundations of social life/ the New York assailant of 
Mr Smith really does not seem to suspect that honesty and good 
faith are among them, and that all the English clergyman asks of 
Pennsylvania is to be honest, in the lowest and commonest sense 
of that reproachful word, which we can no longer, as one would 
think from the tone of this writer in the ' Post/ bear to have 
uttered in our presence. 

" But let us now look at the matter just as it really stands. The 
Rev. Sydney Smith, as anybody may learn who will inquire, is a 
man known throughout Europe for his wit, logic, and the general 
vigour of his mind. He was, above forty years ago, one of the 
founders and main supporters of the ' Edinburgh Review ; ' and he is 
now one of the most popular and powerful writers of his time, read 
alike on both sides of the Atlantic. He is an old Whig ; and foi 
the sin of maintaining manfully, against all his worldly interests, 
the cause of free institutions, the cause of Irish emancipation, and 



i 9 S MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

the cause of Parliamentry reform, he was kept low in the Church, 
as long- as the Tories had power ; and supported himself and his 
family, in no small degree, by his pen. He was, in fact, for many 
years a very poor parson, in a very poor parish in Yorkshire, where 
he was much loved by his parishioners for his active goodness ; 
taking pains, among other things, to study medicine, in order to be 
able to practise it gratuitously among them, as there was no phy- 
sician in their neighbourhood, and they could not afford to send 
abroad for one. When he was about sixty years old, the Whigs 
came into office, and gave him a good living. From this, it seems, 
he made in his old age some savings : and, having confidence in 
free institutions and American honesty, he invested a part, or the 
whole, of these savings in Pennsylvania stocks. But his interest 
there is not paid, and his capital is shrunk to a merely nominal 
value. He of course complains. He tells us even that we are not 
honest. We answer, ' you rave,' you are ' impertinent/ you are 
i impudent,' you are ' a reverend slanderer.' But what, in the 
meantime, do honourable men everywhere say better about us ? 
and how comfortably does an American, always before so proud to 
call himself such, feel, who is now travelling in any part of the 
world out of his own country ! Nay, how do we ourselves feel 
about our conduct and character in our own secret hearts at hornet 

" One word more. The Rev. Sydney Smith is, after all, only the 
representative of a very large class of men, chiefly in England, but 
also to be found scattered more or less over the best portions of the 
continent of Europe, who now think and talk of the indebted States 
of America exactly as he does. They are men of moderate pro- 
perty and much intelligence. They have had greater confidence 
in free institutions than the "rich and the powerful around them. 
They have looked upon us Americans especially with kindness, 
respect, and cheerful trust ; when others, of more worldly consider- 
ation than themselves, have looked upon us with aversion and 
contempt. They have been, in short, our sincere friends ; and 
partly because they were our friends, and believed in us and our 
forms of government, they have lent us their money to the amount 
of above a hundred millions of dollars, perhaps more nearly two 
hundred. And how have we requited their confidence ? Mr Smith's 
petition may inform us. We may learn from it, too, that we must 
do something to regain for ourselves the decent consideration among 
mankind which we have forfeited, — and forfeited, too, merely to 
save ourselves from paying a certain number of ' dollars and cents,' 
as the writer in the ' Evening Post ' would say, which we are quite 
aware we honestly owe. 

" The people of Massachusetts and New England, and indeed 
the people of the majority of these States, are not called upon to 






MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 199 

take to themselves any more of the censures of Mr Smith than a 
man is obliged to take of the censures that fall on a disgraced 
community with which he is intimately associated. We may 
therefore well be thankful, and in some degree proud, that these 
States have committed no injustice towards their creditors ; but 
while we are thankful for this, we must also be careful not to coun- 
tenance the dishonest States in their dishonesty, nor to seem eager 
to rebuke a foreign creditor who comes among us boldly demand- 
ing his dues." 

But what gratified my father most was a private letter he received 
shortly after his American letters were written, from his friend Mr 
Wainwright, giving an account of the arrival of a steamer at New 
York, with a Sydney Smith on board. Mr Wainwright's letter 
best states what happened. 

"New York, July 15, 1844. 
" Rev. and dear Sir, 

" Upon the recent arrival of the ' Great Western,' in the list of 
passengers published, was Sydney Smith / The next morning the 
newspapers trumpeted throughout the land that ' the founder of 
the Edinburgh Review,' 'the distinguished Prebendary of St Paul's/ 
* the man of a thousand of the happiest sayings of the age,' and, 
above all, ' the scourge of repudiating Pennsylvania,' had actually 
arrived in this remote hemisphere ! What was to he done ? 
Should he be tarred and feathered, or lynched ? Quite the contrary ! 
He was to he feted, rejoiced in, and even Pennsylvania was to meet 
him with cordial salutations. A hundred dinners were arranged at 
the moment, and the guests selected. When, lo ! he who had 
caused this great excitement turned out to be some humble New 
York trader, of whom nobody had ever heard before ! Now he 
might have signed himself S. Smith, and all would have been well ; 
it would have passed for Samuel, Simeon, or Shearjashub. But in 
an evil hour he had the vanity or presumption to write in full, and 
hence have come upon us disappointments without end. As a 
proper reparation, we must insist upon his applying to the Legis- 
lature to have an agnomen, with which he has no business, changed. 

"Among the disappointed were numbers of my congregation, 
who, seeing, a very dignified clerical-looking stranger in my pew 
at St John's, the day after the ' Western ' arrived, jumped at the 
conclusion, and stared a worthy ecclesiastic almost out of counte- 
nance as he went out of church ; and his only consolation is, that 
he came nearer to passing for a wit than he ever did before, or 
ever will again. But the most disappointed person was your old 
schoolmate, and my excellent friend, Moore ; who, being confined 
to the house, and hearing the Sunday report from his family, was 



20O MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

momentarily expecting, for three hours after service, to take his 
Winchester friend by the hand. 

" Now, would it be possible for you to give us the only solace 
for these disappointments ? The ships and steamers are admir- 
able, the passage in summer and autumn by no means arduous, 
the greeting awaiting you the heartiest possible, and the country 
and people — you will judge of them when you come. In New 
York you will find a home prepared in my house ; and to show 
you that you will not want others in other places, I send you a 
letter which I received from the Bishop of New Jersey, from his 
beautiful place, Riverside. 

u Most truly your obedient friend and servant, 

"J. M. Wainwright." 

From the Bishop of New Jersey. 

"Riverside, July 8, 1844. 
" My dear Wainwright, 
" I notice the arrival of the Rev. Sydney Smith by the ' Great 
Western.' I desire to offer him the hospitality of Riverside. You 
have been promising me a visit ; I propose to you that you invite 
him to come on with you on Monday or Tuesday of next week, as 
may be most agreeable to you. I name that time, as we propose 
a visit to Niagara, Toronto, &c, on the following week. Let me 
hear from you as soon as convenient. I observe that your daughter 
has sailed for Europe ; we follow her with our best wishes. 
" With best love to all yours, ever your affectionate brother, 

" G. W. Doane." 

Though my father made his own claims the plea for undertaking 
this cause, he was now become, through private sources, a rich man, 
and what he lost was a mere trifle. But during the excitement his 
letters caused, it was curious that, whilst abuse flowed in from the 
other side of the Atlantic by every packet, which he used to read 
to us at breakfast with great good-humour, on this side he was 
regarded as the lion's mouth at Venice. He writes on one occasion, 
evidently much amused : — 

" Dear Van de Weyer, 
" Many thanks ; they seem puzzled with the whole thing, and 
cannot make me out. What a mistake, to depreciate my beauty 
and my orthodoxy ! 

" Ever yours, 

" Sydney Smith." 

Letter after letter poured in by every post, of gratitude, encourage- 






MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 201 

ment, thanks, tales of losses and miseries occasioned by this want 
of faith in the repudiating States, as if these aggrieved persons 
looked upon him as the champion of public faith throughout 
Christendom. 

I ought, in justice, to mention, that together with the abuse, 
there came frequently from America little offerings, such as apples, 
cheese, &c., from unknown individuals, unwilling, as they said, to 
share the public shame, and offering their quota towards the pay- 
ment of the Pennsylvanian debt. 



I have, in the first part of this Memoir, given some few extracts, 
to show the deep impression he then produced in the pulpit ; I 
shall now give a letter written on hearing him in his old age at St 
Paul's, by a medical man, of eminence in his profession. 

" My dear Mr Smith, 
" Not being ' a brown man of Pennsylvania,' I pay my just debts ; 
and I offer to you the tribute of my sincere thanks for one of the 
most impressive and eloquent discourses, delivered yesterday at St 
Paul's, that it has ever fallen to my lot to hear. I wish I could read 
it. There is a magic in your name, which, if it was published, 
would incite everybody to read it, and no one is too good or too 
bad not to derive profit from such an appeal to his reason and his 
conscience. To pass by your merits of style and elocution, — 
peculiar, and beyond my praise, — the simple, straightforward 
method of treating your subject, delighted me. It is a rare and 
refreshing gratification to listen, in these times of discord and strife 
on matters of faith, to a preacher whose improvement of his text is 
not encumbered by references to historical or traditional details ; 
and whose style, clear, logical, and fervid, carries with him the 
reason as well as the feeling of his audience, by making their 
intellects a party to their conviction. The mystical phraseology of 
scriptural preachers (so called) always appears to me a hindrance, 
rather than a help to serious piety ; and I should hail the day of 
salvation for the Church, not of this nor of that denomination, but 
of Christ, when such sermons were heard in every cathedral 
throughout the country, as that which you delivered in the 
metropolitan last Sunday ; which, I will undertake to assert, no 
hearer did not feel to be a spiritual gain and encouragement." 

Another short sketch, lately sent me by my friend Mrs Austin, I 
shall also insert ; giving her impressions on hearing my father for 
the first time preach in St Paul's. She went there at his invitation, 



202 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

in consequence of a previous conversation, in which Mrs Austin, 
after expressing her surprise at the feeble effect generally produces 
in the pulpit, attributed it in part to the vague generalities to which 
preachers too often confined themselves. Standing there, as they 
do, with the enormous advantage of duty, reason, and religion com^ 
mantling them to speak, she thought that they ought to make each 
moral evil which afflicts society the object of special and energetic 
attack. 

"For example," she said, "why do you not preach a sermon 
against the love of war ?" My father, who most warmly coincided 
with these feelings against war, as may be seen in many of his 
letters, exclaimed, " You are right ; it shall be done ; come and 
hear me." She went, and shall tell her own impressions. 

" I was immediately struck, as I have frequently been since, at 
the peculiar character and aspect of the congregation at St Paul's ; 
and at the remarkable sympathy that appeared to exist between 
the pastor and his flock. The choir was densely filled, yet it would 
have been difficult to detect in the crowd any of those diversities of 
station which are usually but too strongly marked in a London 
church. It appeared one homogeneous body of sedate, earnest, 
respectable citizens and their families, — no obtrusive air of fashion, 
no painful look of poverty. 

" I must confess that I went to hear Mr Smith preach, with some 
misgiving as to the effect which that well-known face and voice, 
ever associated with wit and mirth, might have upon me, even 
in the sacred place. Never were misgivings more quickly and 
entirely dissipated. The moment he appeared in the pulpit, all the 
weight of his duty, all the authority of his office, were written on 
his countenance ; and without a particle of affectation (of which 
he was incapable), his whole demeanour bespoke the gravity of his 
purpose.* Perhaps indeed it was the more striking to one who had 
till then only seen him delighting society by his gay and overflow- 
ing wit. As soon as he began to speak, the whole choir, upon 
which I looked down, exhibited one mass of upraised, attentive, 
thoughtful faces. It seemed as if his deep, earnest tones were 
caught with silent eagerness ; and I could not but feel that the 
perfect good sense, the expansive benevolence, the plain exposition 
of Christian duty, which fell from his lips, found a soil well fitted 
to receive it. His hearers looked like men who came prepared 
'to mark/ and able 'inwardly to digest/ the truths and the counsels 
he so clearly and emphatically placed before them. I remember 

* I cannot resist adding here how often and how strongly I have felt this sudden and 
impressive change in my father. On entering the pulpit, the calm dignity of his eye, 
mien, and voice, made one feel that he was indeed, and felt himself to be, " the pastor 
standing between our God and His people," to teach His laws, to declare His judgments, 
and proclaim His mercies. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 203 

no religious service which ever appeared to me more solemn, more 
impressive, or more calculated to bear its appropriate fruit, — the 
subjugation of fierce and restless passions, and the culture of a just, 
humane, and Christian temper." 



This winter Miss Edgeworth visited London for the last time. 
During her visit she saw much of my father ; and her talents, as 
well as her love and thorough knowledge of Ireland, made her con- 
versation peculiarly agreeable to him. I wish I had kept some notes 
of these conversations, several of which took place at my house, 
and which were very remarkable ; but I have only a characteristic 
and amusing letter she wrote to me. soon after her return home, 
from which the following is an extract : — 



'£> 



" I have not the absurd presumption to think your father would 
leave London or Combe Florey, for Ireland, voluntarily ; but I 
wish some Irish bishopric were forced upon him, and that his own 
sense of national charity and humanity would forbid him to refuse. 
Then, obliged to reside amongst us, he would see, in the twinkling 
of an eye (such an eye as his), all our manifold grievances up and 
down the country. One word, one bon mot of his, would do more 

for us, I guess, than Mr 's four hundred pages, and all the like, 

with which we have been bored. One letter from Sydney Smith on 
the affairs of Ireland, with his name to it, and after having been 
there, would do more for us than his letters did for America and 
England ; — a bold assertion, you will say, and so it is ; but I 
calculate that Pat is a far better subject for wit than Jonathan 5 it 
only plays round Jonathan's head, but it goes to Pat's heart, — to 
the very bottom of his heart, where he loves it ; and he don't care 
whether it is for or against him, so that it is real wit and fun. 
Now Pat would dote upon your father, and kiss the rod with all his 
soul, he would,— the lash just lifted, — when he'd see the laugh on 
the face, the kind smile, that would tell him it was all for his good. 

" Your father would lead Pat (for he ; d never drive him) to the 
world's end, and maybe to common sense at the end, — might open 
his eyes to the true state of things and persons, and cause him to 
ax himself how it comes that, if he be so distressed by the 
Sassenach landlords that he can't keep soul and body together, 
nor one farthing for the wife and children, after paying the rint for 
the land, still and nevertheless he can pay King Dan's rint, aisy, — 
thousands of pounds, not for lands or potatoes, but just for castles 
in the air. Methinks I hear Pat saying the words, and see him 
jump to the conclusion, that maybe the gintieman, his reverence, 



204 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

that'&U the way with him}* might be the man after all to do 
them all the good in life, and asking nothing at all from them. 
1 Better, sure, than Dan, after all ! and we will follow him through 
thick and thin. Why no ? What though he is his reverence, the 
Church, that is our c/eargy, won't object to him ; for he was never 
an inimy any way, but always for paying them off handsome, and 
fools if they don't take it now. So down with King Dan, for he's 
no good ! and up with Sydney — he 's the man, king of glory /' 

" But, visions of glory, and of good better than glory, spare my 
longing sight ! else I shall never come to an end of this note. 
Note indeed ! I beg your pardon. 

" Yours affectionately, 

" Maria Edgeworth." 

Miss Edgeworth says, in one of her letters to her sister, after one 
of the evenings spent in my father's society : — " Delightful, I need 
not say ; but to attempt to Boswell Sydney Smith's conversations 
would be out-Boswelling Boswell indeed." I have felt the truth of 
this observation most strongly in writing these Memoirs, and 
should have flung down my pen in despair had I not had brighter 
and better, though easier, things to tell of my father than the 
effusions of his wit. 

I shall now give a short correspondence between my father and 
Sir Robert Peel, as it does equal honour to both : — 

"May $, 1844. 
" Sir, 
" I am informed there will be a vacancy in July of a clerkship 
in the Record Office, in that department of it over which Mr 
Hardy, I believe, presides. There is a family of the name of 

■ , residing in , who have formerly been in affluence, but 

have fallen with the fall of the West Indies. The mother and 
daughter are teaching music. The son is an excellent lad, under- 
standing and speaking French and German, and is a humble 
candidate for this situation of Clerk of the Records, worth about 
eighty pounds per annum. Mr Hardy, a very old friend of the 
family, is very desirous of getting the young man into his office. 

* This expression, " that has the way with him" refers to a conversation my father 
had with Dr Doyle, at a time he was anxious to learn as far as possible what effect the 
measures he was proposing would have upon the Catholics. He proposed that Govern- 
ment should pay the Catholic priests. "They would not take it," said Dr Doyle. 
"Do you mean to say, that if every priest in Ireland received to-morrow morning a 
Government letter with a hundred pounds, first quarter of their year's income, that 
they would refuse it?" "Ah, Mr Smith," said Dr Doyle, "you've such a way of 
putting things ! " 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



205 



A better family does not exist, or one fighting up more bravely 
against adversity. The mother has been repeatedly to me, to beg 
I would state these things to you. I stated to her that I had so 
little the honour of your acquaintance, that, though I had met you, 
I should hardly presume to bow to you in the street. But the 
poor lady said I had evidence to give, if I had not influence to use; 
and at last I consented to do what I am doing. I beg therefore to 
observe, I am not asking anything of you (no man has less right 
to do so) ; I am merely stating facts to you respecting an office of 
which you have the disposal. I have no other acquaintance with 
the family than through their misfortunes, borne with such 
unshaken constancy. 

" I beg you will not give yourself the trouble to answer this 
letter. If my evidence induces you to make any inquiries about 
the young lad, that will be the best answer. If not, I shall attribute 
it to some of the innumerable obstacles which prevent a person in 
your situation from giving way to the impulses of compassion and 
good-nature. 

" I have the honour to be, &c, 

" Sydney Smith." 

" Whitehall, May 6, 1844. 
"Sir, 
" I do not recollect that I ever made a promise of an appoint- 
ment not actually vacant. I try to defer as long as possible the 
evil day which brings to me the invidious duty of selecting one 
from a hundred candidates, and disappointment to ninety-nine of 
them. 

" But I am so sure that, when the particular vacancy mentioned 
in your letter shall occur, there will be no claim which it will give 
me greater satisfaction to comply with, than one brought under my 
notice by you, from such kind and benevolent motives as those 
which alone would induce you to write to me, that I do not hesitate 
a moment in making an exception from my general rule, and in at 

once giving you a promise, either that Mr shall have the 

appointment you name, or one equally eligible ; and not at a more 
distant period, if possible. 

" All the return I shall ask from you is the privilege of renewing, 
when we meet, the honour of your acquaintance. 

" I am, Sir, with sincere esteem, 

" Your faithful servant, 

" Robert Peel." 

The office was granted, and my father had the satisfaction to 
hear that the young man was found most efficient in it. He shortly 



206 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

after sent Sir Robert Peel his works, with the " sincere respect and 
esteem of the author" written on the title-page. He received the 
following answer : — 

" Whitehall. 
" Dear Sir, 
" Though you have not opened to me any new source of interest 
or instruction, I thank you sincerely for the volumes you have sent 
me, and for the few words in the first page which put on record my 
title to the in. 

" They are duplicates of a work which has been in my possession 
since the first day of its publication. I am very familiar with its 
contents ; and have no feeling connected with my general recollec- 
tion of them but those to which the combination of good sense, 
wit, and genius naturally give rise. 

" Believe me, my dear Sir, very faithfully yours, 

" Robert Peel." 



The following are a few notes from the journal of a lady, since 
distinguished, both by her talents and the use she has made of 
them, who formed the acquaintance of my father many years ago. 
She gave them to me, adding, prettily, the pleasure it gave her to 
be able, by so doing, to throw one more stone on my father's cairn. 
With these I have mingled some few anecdotes from other sources. 

"If I recollect right, it .was about the year 1812 that I first had 
the gratification to meet Mr Sydney Smith, — it was at the house of 
Mr Josiah Wedgewood. He arrived about the middle of the day, 
with his wife and children. He entered, and in an instant made 
everybody feel at their ease, and infused a portion of his own 
animation into all around him. I remember him standing with 
his back to the fire, or leaning over the back of his chair, convers- 
ing with us for several hours. The conversation turned, amongst 
other things, on politics. ' I consider the Whigs as shipwrecked 
for ever ; no chance of my being made even a dean ; so I have 
laid down my plan of life. I will make myself, if not as rich as 
others, at least as rich and happy as an honest man can be.' The 
next morning he took a long walk over the hills with us ; and most 
agreeable he was, giving out his mind with a variety and abund- 
ance of ideas which delighted us, and showed how little need he 
had of external excitement to call forth his powers of wit and 
.visdom. He was at this time stout-made, his face handsome, with 
that pale embonpoint which always distinguished him, and his 
remarkable deep dark eye, which I think retained its character 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 207 

even to the last ; — indeed, I should say, never was the external 
appearance of any man less altered by years than his. When 
speaking of the impression made by his manner and appearance, 
his delightful laugh must not be forgotten, — so genuine, so full of 
hearty enjoyment, that it was a source of gaiety only, to hear it. 
It was his custom to stroll about the room in which we were 
sitting, and which was lined with books, taking down one lot after 
another, sometimes reading or quoting aloud, sometimes discuss- 
ing any subject that arose. He took down a sort of record of 
those men who had lived to a great age. ' A record of little value/ 
said Mrs W., 'as to live longer than other people can hardly be 
the desire of any one.' ' It is not so much the longevity/ he 
answered, ' that is valued, as that original build and constitution, 
that condition of health and habit of life, which not only leads to 
longevity, but makes life enjoyable whilst it lasts, that renders the 
subject interesting and worth inquiry.' 

" ' I think a good life of Erasmus much wanted ; the mild con- 
ciliating temper of the subject would make it no unfit theme for a 
lady's pen.' 

" ' You must preach, Mr Smith/ said Mrs W. (it was Saturday.) 
'We must go and try the pulpit, then,' said he, 'to see if it suits 
me.' So to the church we walked ; and how he amused us by his 
droll way of trying the pulpit, as he called it ; — his criticisms on 
the little old-fashioned sounding-board, which seemed ready to fall 
on his head, and which, he said, would infallibly extinguish him ! 
' I can't bear/ said he, ' to be imprisoned in the true orthodox way 
in my pulpit, with my head just peeping above the desk. I like 
to look down upon my congregation, — to fire into them. The 
common people say I am a bould preacher, for I like to have my 
arms free, and to thump the pulpit. A singular contretemps hap- 
pened to me once, when, to effect this, I had ordered the clerk to 
pile up some hassocks for me to stand on. My text was, ' We are 
perplexed, but not in despair ; persecuted, but not forsaken ; cast 
down, but not destroyed.' I had scarcely uttered these words, and 
was preparing to illustrate them, when I did so practically and in 
a way I had not at all anticipated. My fabric of hassocks suddenly 
gave way : down I fell, and with difficulty prevented myself from 
being precipitated into the arms of my congregation ; who, I must 
say, behaved very well, and recovered their gravity sooner than I 
could have expected. But my adventure was not so bad as that 
of a friend of mine. A tame raven had got into the church ; no 
sooner did he begin his sermon, than the raven, in high caw, 
rushed at his book, seized it in his bill, and had almost effected 
his escape with it, before the astonished preacher was aware of his 
danger. He caught at it, however ; — the bird pulled and sawed, 



208 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

he tugged and scolded ; the congregation were to a man with the 
bird, who fought valiantly for his prize ; and it was not till after a 
severe struggle, in which victory remained for a long time doubtful, 
that my friend rescued his sermon and banished his enemy, amidst 
the roars of laughter of his congregation/ 

" I have never seen any one who approached Sydney Smith in 
power of thought, united with the greatest candour. He was one 
who saw subjects on all sides from the height of an elevated 
genius. His reputation has been much founded on his powers of 
entertaining, which are very great, indeed unrivalled ; yet I prefer 
his serious conversation. One morning, seeing me lounging in the 
library, looking at idle books, he took down ' Berkeley on Vision,' 
and advised me to read it, as excessively ingenious and well worth 
making myself acquainted with. 

" ' Live/ said he, ' always in the best company when you read. 
No one in youth thinks on the value of time. Do you ever reflect 
how you pass your life ? If you live to seventy-two, which I hope 
you may, your life is spent in the following manner : — An hour 
a day is three years ; this makes twenty-seven years sleeping, — 
nine years dressing, — nine years at table, — six years playing with 
children, — nine years walking, drawing, ami visiting, — six years 
shopping, — and three years quarrelling.' I did not then perhaps 
value these marks of interest in the progress of a young girl's mind 
as I have learned to do since. 

" In 1816 I had again the happiness to pass a few days with Mr 
Smith in the same family, and we found him, if possible, still more 
delightful than before : he would sit for hours with us by the fire, 
discoursing and making us all wiser and better, and of course most 
proud and happy, by his notice. One day he took a walk by the 
canal ; he put a case of morality : — a man digging a canal dis- 
covers some limestone-rock, waits till the land comes into the 
market, purchases it, and makes a great deal of money by his dis- 
covery. I doubted whether the man was right ; he maintained 
the man had a right to profit by his own discovery. The discus- 
sion lasted long, but I only recollect the patience he had with my 
arguments ; and though he did not succeed in converting me to 
his opinion at that time, he did not make me feel afraid to own it 
to him. 

" ' Keep as much as possible in the grand and common road of 
life ; patent educations or habits seldom succeed. Depend upon 
it, men set more value on the cultivated minds than on the accom- 
plishments of women, which they are rarely able to appreciate. It 
is a common error, but it is an error, that literature unfits women 
for the everyday business of life. It is not so with men : you see 
those of the most cultivated minds constantly devoting their time 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 209 

and attention to the most homely objects. Literature gives women 
a real and proper weight in society, but then they must use it with 
discretion ; if the stocking is blue, the petticoat must be long, as 
my friend Jeffrey says ; the want of this has furnished food for 
ridicule in all ages.' 

" ' Never give way to melancholy ; resist it steadily, for the 
habit will encroach. I once gave a lady two-and-twenty recipes 
against melancholy : one was a bright fire ; another, to remember 
all the pleasant things said to and of her ; another, to keep a box 
of sugar-plums on the chimneypiece, and a kettle simmering on 
the hob.' I thought this mere trifling at the moment, but have in 
after-life discovered how true it is that these little pleasures often 
banish melancholy better than higher and more exalted objects ; 
and that no means ought to be thought too trifling which can 
oppose it either in ourselves or others. 

" ' Industry ! you may do anything with industry. A friend of 
mine has mastered Greek, Latin, mathematics, and music, in an 
extraordinary degree, together with all the ologies ; and yet without 
any remarkable abilities, by industry alone.' 

" ' The law is decidedly the best profession for a young man, if 
he has anything in him. In the Church a man is thrown into life 
with his hands tied, and bid to swim ; he does well if he keeps his 
head above water. But then in the law he must have a stout 
heart and an iron digestion, and must be regular as the town 
clock, or he may as well retire. Attorneys expect in a lawyer the 
constancy of the turtle-dove.' 

" ' Oh ! I am happy to see all who will visit me ; I have lived 
twenty years in the country, and have never met a bore.' 

" Some one said it was foolhardy in General Fitzpatrick to insist 
upon going up alone in the balloon, when it was found there was not 
force to carry up two. ' No,' he said, ' there is always something 
sublime in sacrificing to great principles; his profession was 
courage.' 

" Many years after, I met him at the house of a relation in 
London. He called in on his way from some dinner-party or other ; 
he was in high spirits, and never, I think, did such a torrent of wit, 
fun, nonsense, pointed remark, just observation, and happy illus- 
tration, flow pell-mell from the lips of a man. That is the only 
time in my life that I ever saw him in what is called full force, and 
it made an impression on me which I can never forget. 

" I saw him again after the appearance of my first book. How 
kind he was ! how happy and polite were the things he said upon 
the occasion ! How few have the art to do such things so well ! 
He made me sit by him, and paid me the refined compliment of 
letting me feel that he thought my mind worth inquiring into. 

o 



2io MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

After this I saw him only as one of the general circle, collected 
around him in a London drawing-room, where he kept up the ball 
of conversation by his irresistible and inexhaustible fun and fancy; 
but I still, as in early life, continued to prefer his serious conversa- 
tion, — his wisdom to his wit? 



CHAPTER XI. 

Pamphlet on Ballot — Fragment on Irish Church— Letter from Lord Murray— Lines 
Written on Receiving Garden-Chair — Lines by Lady Carlisle — Christens Child — 
Sketch of Life and Conversation at Combe Florey— Advice to Parishioners— Con- 
versation — Medicines for the Poor — Saves Servant's Life — Fallacies — Studies — 
Recipe for Salad— Letter of Marion de Lorme — Imitation of Sir James Mackintosh 
— Close of the Day. 

After this period, the only things he wrote were a short pamphlet 
on the ballot, which went through many editions, and had much 
success ; and the Fragment on Ireland, which he left behind, and 
which my mother published after his death ; showing that he died 
as he had lived, earnest in the cause of religious toleration and the 
amelioration of Ireland, and though he did not live to see all he 
wished in Ireland accomplished, yet, as Johnson says, "He who is 
cut off in the execution of an honest undertaking, has at least the 
honour of falling in his rank, and has fought the battle, though he 
missed the victory." 

In the autumn, hearing that his friend Mr Van de Weyer and 
his family were coming into the west, my father sent him the fol- 
lowing note : — 

" October 1843. 
" Health to the greatest of diplomatists, and, to the Belgian king- 
dom, trade, glory, and peace ! You must not pass this way without 
visiting Combe Florey ; we shall expect you on the 9th, we dine at 
seven, — Madame Van de Weyer, you, and the little ambassador. 
We are six miles from Taunton, and Taunton is an hour and a half 
from Bristol. If you write to Sweet's Hotel, they will have horses 
ready for you, and the people know the way to my house. Pray 
write a line to say whether we may expect you ; we shall be 
delighted to see you, and truly mortified to miss you. 

" Yours ever very truly, 

" Sydney Smith." 

They came and spent a day or two with us ; days, alas ! of in- 
cessant rain, putting the charms of the little parsonage to the 
severest trial. But if it was dark and gloomy without, it was all 
gaiety and sunshine within ; for our guests came disposed to be 



212 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

pleased with everything they found, and the intercourse of two such 
remarkable men as Mr Van de Weyer and my father, both loving 
to exercise their minds on grave and important subjects, and both 
possessing such a fund of knowledge, wit, anecdote, and clever non- 
sense, to intermingle with them, made one quite forget the passage 
of time, and the visit seemed over almost as soon as begun. They 
left us on the most lovely morning, when Combe Florey had put 
on her gayest and freshest garb ; and carried away, I trust, as 
agreeable impressions as they left behind. In the evening of 
the same day on which they left us arrived Mr Van de Weyer' s 
secretary, bearing a summons to Windsor, which, owing to Mr 
Van de Weyer's movements, had remained some days unnoticed, 
and it became necessary to follow him to Bowood immediately. 

But as Mr De la P could not arrive till one or two in the 

morning, my father thought Madame Van de Weyer might be much 
alarmed by suddenly hearing, in the middle of the night, that a 
messenger had arrived fro?n home, and it was agreed that Mr De 

la P should send in the following note, to set their minds at 

ease. 

" Dear Van de Weyer, 
" Long live the Belgic lion ! long may he roar over the tiger of 

France ! You are wanted at Windsor. De la P is below. 

The young ambassador and all the children, and all the grandpapas, 

are quite well. There is an air of piety in De la P that is very 

agreeable to me. 

" Ever yours, 

" Sydney Smith. 
" Get up immediately." 

And he wrote afterwards more at length, to explain, as he says, 
his share in the transaction. 

" Dear Van de Weyer, 
" Let me explain my share in the proceedings. Between five and 
six o'clock appeared in a fly a grave person, who denominated him- 
self Octave De la P , in search of you. I concluded, by the 

solemnity of his aspect, that he was come to announce the last days 
of the Belgian monarchy. On the contrary, it was to carry you off 
to the Castle at Windsor. He could not go from hence, seeing the 
time of his arrival, till the eleven o'clock train ; and as he was 
resolute to have you, and I believe Madame also, in London by six 
o'clock to-morrow, we agreed that nothing remained but to proceed 
to Chippenham in the train, to extract you from Bowood, and to 
convey you to the metropolis. I told him he would be most pro- 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 213 

bably shot at Bowood by the watchman ; but he declared that his 
papers were all in order, and to die in the performance of his 
duty was a glorious death for a Belgian. I wrote a jocular note to 
send up to your bedside, that you might not be alarmed about your 
children. 

" If Octave De la P has perished in the invasion of Bowood, 

I certify that he died with the deepest admiration of the ever- 
memorable Belgic revolution. 

" Yours very truly, 

" Sydney Smith." 

" October 12th, 1843." 

It was about this period that Lord Jeffrey, having determined to 
publish a collection of his contributions to the Edinburgh Review, 
as many of the early contributors had already done, did my father 
the honour to dedicate them to him, and, by a few words in it, con- 
firmed my father's account of the origin of the Edinburgh Review. 
I have heard my father say that there was hardly any event in the 
whole course of his life that had gratified him more deeply than 
this dedication from his old friend, Lord Jeffrey. 

As I am anxious to make this sketch of my father as complete as 
possible, I shall here insert a few extracts from a letter, containing 
his recollections of him, written at my request by Lord Murray ; 
who speaks not only with the authority of his own high character, 
but of early acquaintance, and an unbroken friendship of half a 
century. 

" Sydney's acute and almost intuitive perception of character 
made him at once detect whatever was fictitious or assumed ; but 
though this never escaped his keen observation, he was, I firmly 
believe, more severe towards himself than he was ever towards any 
other person. His disgust at hypocrisy made him so anxious to 
avoid the semblance of any attempt to appear better than he was, 
that he did not always do himself justice. * Many, I should say 
most, of his just or benevolent actions were only known to his most 
intimate friends, and that accidently * The goodness of his heart 
was only revealed by his acts. 

" He was so free and open in discourse, that he gave all manner 
of advantage to those who were disposed to distrust a person over- 
flowing in genial wit and humour. 

"Though Sydney Smith could not avoid being conscious of his 
great powers of writing and speaking, I firmly believe that his 
estimate of himself and of his own character were truly humble. 

* Many as I have told, how many more I have been obliged to suppress, from reasons 
easily understood !— Author. 



2T4 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

He was ready to acknowledge the superiority of persons whose 
abilities were inferior to his own. He claimed little more for him- 
self than practical common sense ; but though this was all he 
claimed, he could not help clothing his sound sense with language 
which was beautiful, and at the same time more witty and humour- 
ous than that of other men. Yet, putting himself lower in the 
scale, I believe, than he had a fair right to be, he never acquiesced 
in any opinions in which he did not agree, though coming from the 
highest station, either secular or clerical. The higher they were, 
the more he considered it his duty to discuss and examine the 
opinions they proclaimed to the public. In doing so he felt he 
was vindicating the rights of the humblest curate in the Church, 
or defending those who could not defend themselves from the 
attacks of men in high stations, who often made them in places 
where they could not be otherwise refuted. 

" Whether he did not render a greater service to the public and 
to his profession by this intrepid conduct, than he could have done 
by the most respectful and submissive silence, it is for others to 
determine ; but his fearless assertion of what he conceived to be 
the right, is perfectly consistent with the most modest estimate of 
his own merits. 

" Sydney Smith thought it right and honest to act openly, and 
avow whatever he wrote, without regard to any personal conse- 
quence that might result to himself. ' There are some men who, if 
a serious truth is to be supported or enforced, insist that every 
argument or illustration should be equally solemn and grave. 
They forget that a person of Sydney Smith's powers would be but 
half an ally if he did not employ the wit and humour with which 
he was endowed to enforce truth or expose pretension. Such men 
would prefer the dullest argument to the most withering and con- 
vincing exposure of a fallacy. 

" A foreigner, on one occasion, indulging in sceptical doubts of 
the existence of an overruling Providence in his presence, Sydney, 
who had observed him evidently well satisfied with his repast, said, 
1 You must admit there is great genius and thought in that dish/ 
' Admirable ! ' he replied ; ' nothing can be better/ ' May I then 
ask, are you prepared to deny the existence of the cook ? ' Many 
anecdotes equally characteristic might be furnished by his old 
friends, but I fear to repeat what you may have already been told, 
and have merely hinted at some traits of Sydney's character known 
only to his most intimate friends." 

The following is an extract from some lines written on receiving 
the present of my father's garden-chair, after his death, from the 
Rector of Combe Florey, by a friend and neighbour : — 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 215 

" Thanks for thy gift ! 'twill ofttimes bring to mind 
A friend who was the friend of human kind; 
A man who had no equal amongst men, 
Whene'er he chose to wield the moral pen. 
For wit, truth, genius, courage, all conspired 
To make (and made at last) a sage inspired, 
Whom wise men loved, and even wits admired. 

" Whate'er was true, he loved ; but all pretence, 
Pride without merit, learning without sense, 
Small niggard piety, which deals in tracts, 
And substitutes cant words for Christian acts, 
He hated. And most holy war did wage 
With each Tartuffe, who shamed our English stage. 

" Peace to his spirit ! Many a year will run 
Into oblivion ere another sun 
Like his will rise and lend the world its light. 
Honour to him ! to thee thanks, and good-night !" 

I find some lines in a letter from Lady Carlisle (one of the 
kindest and warmest of my father's friends) to my mother, written 
soon after his death, on passing within sight of Foston. They 
have been carefully preserved by my mother ; and though meant 
for no eye but hers, my father so valued any proof of Lady Car- 
lisle's regard, that I must not omit them here : — 

" Is that the roof, to friendship dear, 

Where Genius once with matchless ray, 
Illumined all within its sphere, 
And all was brilliant, all was gay 1 

" Yes I there the joyous laugh was raised, 
And converse held with social glee. 
Sydney, by wits and sages praised, 
Shall still be loved and mourn'd by me." 

I might, to these little tributes of affection which I have already 
given, add such a list of mourners for his loss (whose letters have 
all been preserved by my poor mother*), as would claim respect 
for any life, and do honour to any grave. But if I have not already 
succeeded in showing by his actions how worthy he was to be 
respected in life and to be mourned in death, I fear I shall derive 
little aid even from such names, and might run the risk of weary- 
ing my readers. I will therefore go on with what little remains to 
tell of my narrative. 

My father " was sitting at breakfast one morning in the library 

* After my father's death, it was the great comfort and occupation of my mother's life 
to collect and arrange my father's letters and papers, for the purpose of this Memoir, 
and her labours have contributed not a little towards its accomplishment. In one of her 
letters to me, my mother says, "You know the great occupation of my life has been to 
collect materials for some future memorial of my noble-hearted husband." And again, 
" Time goes rapidly on ; I tremble at each day's delay. To have this matter unsettled 
is theonly thing that makes death terrible." 



2i6 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

at Combe Florey," said Mrs Marcet, who was staying with us, 
" when a poor woman came, begging him to christen a new-born 
infant, without loss of time, as she thought it was dying. Mr 
Smith instantly quitted the breakfast-table for this purpose, and 
went off to her cottage. On his return, we inquired in what state 
he had left the poor babe. ' Why,' said he, ' I first gave it a dose 
of castor-oil, and then I christened it ; so now the poor child is 
ready for either world.' " 

I long to give some sketch of these breakfasts, and the mode ot 
life at Combe Florey, where there were often assembled guests that 
would have made any table agreeable anywhere ; but it would be 
difficult to convey an adequate idea of the beauty, gaiety, and hap- 
piness of the scene in which they took place, or the charm that he 
infused into the society assembled round his breakfast-table. The 
room, an oblong, was, as I have already described, surrounded on 
three sides by books, and ended in a bay-window opening into the 
garden ; not brown, dark, dull-looking volumes, but all in the 
brightest bindings ; for he carried his system of furnishing for 
gaiety even to the dress of his books. 

He would come down into this long, low room in the morning 
like a giant " refreshed to run his course," bright and happy as the 
scene around him. " Thank God for Combe Florey ! " he would 
exclaim, throwing himself into his red arm-chair, and looking round ; 
" I feel like a bridegroom in the honeymoon." And in truth I doubt 
if ever bridegroom felt so joyous, or at least made others feel so 
joyous, as he did on these occasions. " Ring the bell, Saba ; " 
the usual refrain, by the by, in every pause, for he contrived to keep 
everybody actively employed around him, and nobody ever objected 
to be so employed. " Ring the bell, Saba." Enter the servant, 

D " D , glorify the room." * This meant that the three 

Venetian windows of the bay were to be flung open, displaying the 
garden on every side, and letting in a blaze of sunshine and flowers. 

D glorifies the room with the utmost gravity, and departs. 

" You would not believe it," he said, " to look at him now, but 

D is a reformed Quaker. Yes, he quaked, or did quake ; his 

brother quakes still ; but D is now thoroughly orthodox. I 

should not like to be a Dissenter in his way ; he is to be one of my 

vergers at St Paul's some day. Lady B calls them my virgins. 

She asked me the other day, ' Pray, Mr Smith, is it true that you 
walk down St Paul's with three virgins holding silver pokers before 

• On reading this passage to two very sensible persons, I was advised to omit this ex- 
pression, as it might give offence. At first I did so, but on reflection I am inclined to 
say, with our old English motto, " Honi soit qui mal y pense ! " In my father's mouth it 
meant only " Let in the glorious light and the beautiful world ; " and instead of anything 
irreverent, his heart was overflowing with gratitude and happiness, and he thanked God 
with his whole h~art for the beautiful world in which He had placed him. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 217 

you ? ' I shook my head, and looked very grave, and bid her come 
and sec. Some enemy of the Church, some Dissenter, had clearly 
been misleading her." 

" There, now," sitting down at the breakfast-table, " take a lesson 
of economy. You never breakfasted in a parsonage before, did 
you ? There, you see, my china is all white, so if broken can 
always be renewed ; the same with my plates at dinner : did you 
observe my plates ? every one a different pattern, some of them 
sweet articles; it was a pleasure to dine upon such a plate as I had 
last night. It is true, Mrs Sydney, who is a great herald, is shocked 
because some of them have the arms of a royal duke or a knight of 
the garter on them, but that does not signify to me. My plan is to 
go into a china-shop and bid them show me every plate they have 
which does not cost more than half-a-crown : you see the result." 

" I think breakfasts so pleasant because no one is conceited 
before one o'clock." 

Mrs Marcet admired his ham. " Oh," said he, " our hams are 
the only true hams ; yours are Shems and Japheths." 

Some one, speaking of the character and writings of Mr : 

" Yes, I have the greatest possible respect for him ; but from his 
feeble voice, he always reminds me of a liberal blue-bottle fly. He 
gets his head down and his hand on your button, and pours into 
you an uninterrupted stream of Whiggism in a low buzz. I have 
known him intimately, and conversed constantly with him for 
the last thirty years, and give him credit for the most enlightened 
mind, and a genuine love of public virtue ; but I can safely say 
that during that period I have never heard one single syllable he 
has uttered." 

Mrs Marcet complaining she could not sleep : " I can furnish 
you" he said, "with a perfect soporific. I have published two 
volumes of sermons ; take them to bed with you. I recommended 
them once to Blanco White, and before the third page he was fast." 

"This is the only sensible spring I remember (1840) : it is a 
real March of intellect." 

" If I were to select a figure to go through life with, it should be 
Windham's figure and Canning's face." 

" I make it a rule to endure no evil that can be remedied. D 

laughs at me for my inventions and contrivances ; but what is the 
consequence of his indolence ? I go to his house and find him 
sitting in his arm-chair, waging war against human existence, and 
a prey to blue-devils ; and all because his pens won't write, his ink 
won't mark, his sealing-wax won't melt, his fires won't burn, his 
blinds won't pull up or down, and his windows and doors won't 
open and shut, — evils which a nail, a drop of water, or five minutes' 
exertion would have remedied." 



218 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

On seeing a very foolish letter by an acquaintance in the news- 
papers : " There ! read that ! what incredible folly ! You pity a 
man who is lame or blind, but you never pity him for being a fool, 
which is often a much greater misfortune." 

Miss Fox was mentioned, who was at that time at Bowood : 
" Oh, she is perfection ; she always gives me the idea of an aged 
angel." 

Some one speaking of the utility of a measure, and quoting 

's opinion : " Yes, he is of the Utilitarian school. That man 

is so hard you might drive a broad-wheeled waggon over him, and 
it would produce no impression j if you were to bore holes in him 
with a gimlet, I am convinced sawdust would come out of him. 
That school treats mankind as if they were mere machines ; the 
feelings or affections never enter into their calculations. If every- 
thing is to be sacrificed to utility, why do you bury your grand- 
mother at all ? why don't you cut her into small pieces at once, 
and make portable soup of her ? 

" By the by, talking of portable soup, my great neighbour, Lord 

D , found it necessary to look a little into his establishment ; 

and the first discovery he made was that his cook had for some 
years been contracting to furnish the navy with portable soup, not 
made of grandmothers, but at his expense." 

" I always say to young people, Beware of carelessness, no fortune 
will stand it long ; you are on the high road to ruin, the moment 
you think yourself rich enough to be careless." 

Speaking of education : " Never teach false morality. How 
exquisitely absurd to tell girls that beauty is of no value, dress of 
no use ! Beauty is of value ; her whole prospects and happiness 
in life may often depend upon a new gown or a becoming bonnet, 
and if she has five grains of common sense she will find this out. 
The great thing is to teach her their just value, and that there 
must be something better under the bonnet than a pretty face for 
real happiness. But never sacrifice truth." 

Talking of beauty of style : " What so beautiful as that of the 
Bible ? what poetry in its language and ideas !" and taking it down 
from the bookcase behind him, he read, with his beautiful voice, and 
in his most impressive manner, several of his favourite passages ; 
amongst others I remember — " Thou shalt rise up before the hoary 
head, and honour the face of an old man ;" and part of that most 
beautiful of Psalms, the 139th: — "O Lord, thou hast searched 
me, and known me. Thou knowest my down-sitting and mine 
up-rising ; thou understandest my thoughts afar off. Thou com- 
passest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all 
my ways. . . . Whither shall I go from thy spirit ? or whither 
shall I flee from thy presence ? If I ascend up into heaven, thou 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 219 

art there ; if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I 
take the wings of the morning, arid dwell in the uttermost parts of 
the sea ; even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand 
shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me, even 
the night shall be light about me ; yea, the darkness hideth not 
from thee ; but the night shineth as the day : the darkness and 
the light are both alike to thee ;" — putting the Bible again on the 
shelf. 

" There is one thing I feel very grateful to my father for having 
taught me, the habit of immediately hunting out any object I found 

myself ignorant of." " Remember that, F (addressing one of 

his grandsons); I have found it most useful : never submit to be 
ignorant when you have knowledge at your elbow." 

Talking of punishments : "*Ah ! that is all very well ; but who 
punishes the bore, let -me ask? There is no social crime com- 
mitted with such impunity." 

" Have you never observed what a dislike servants have to any- 
thing cheap ? they hate saving their master's money. I tried this 
experiment with great success the other day. Finding we con- 
sumed a great deal of soap, I sat down in my thinking-chair, and 
took the soap question into consideration, and I found reason to 
suspect that we were using a very expensive article, where a much 
cheaper one would serve the purpose better. I ordered half-a- 
dozen pounds of both sorts, but took the precaution of changing 
the papers on which the prices were marked, before giving them 
into the hands of Betty. ' Well, Betty, which soap do you find 
washes best?' 'Oh, please Sir, the dearest, in the blue paper; 
it makes a lather as well again as the other.' ■ Well, Betty, you 
shall always have it, then ;' and thus the unsuspecting Betty saved 
me some pounds a year, and washed the clothes better." 

On his little grand-daughter running up to kiss him : " Children 
are excellent physiognomists, and soon discover their real friends. 
Luttrell calls them all lunatics ; and so, in fact, they are. What 
is childhood but a series of happy delusions ? " 

" It is of importance not only that we should do good, but that 
we should do it in the best manner. A little judgment and a little 
reflection added to the gift doubles the value. Now it is lament- 
able to see how ignorant the poor are. I do not mean of reading 
and writing, but about the common affairs of life. They are as 
helpless as children in all difficulties. Nothing would be so useful 
as some short and cheap book, to instruct them what to do, to 
whom to go, and to give them a little advice ; I mean, mere prac- 
tical advice. I have begun something of this sort for my parish- 
ioners ; here it is. 



22o MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



"Advice to Parishioners. 

" If you begin stealing a little, you will go on from little to much, 
and soon become a regular thief; and then you will be hanged, or 
sent over seas to Botany Bay. And give me leave to tell you, 
transportation is no joke. Up at five in the morning, dressed in a 
jacket half blue half yellow, chained on to another person like two 
dogs, a man standing over you with a great stick, weak porridge 
for breakfast, bread and water for dinner, boiled beans for supper, 
straw to lie upon ; and all this for thirty years ; and then you are 
hanged there by order of the governor, without judge or jury. All 
this is very disagreeable, and you had far better avoid it by making 
a solemn resolution to take nothing which does not belong to you. 

" Never sit in wet clothes. Off with them as soon as you can : 
no constitution can stand it. Look at Jackson, who lives next door 
to the blacksmith ; he was the strongest man in the parish. Twenty 
different times I warned him of his folly in wearing wet clothes. 
He pulled off his hat and smiled, and was very civil, but clearly 
seemed to think it all old women's nonsense. He is now, as you 
see, bent double with rheumatism, and is living upon parish allow- 
ance, and scarcely able to crawl from pillar to post. 

" Off with your hat when you meet a gentleman. What does it 
cost ? Gentlemen notice these things, are offended if the civility 
is not paid, and pleased if it is ; and what harm does it do you ? 
When first I came to this parish, Squire Tempest wanted a pos- 
tilion. John Barton was a good, civil fellow ; and in thinking over 
the names of the village, the Squire thought of Barton, remem- 
bered his constant civility, sent for one of his sons, made him his 
postilion, then coachman, then bailiff, and he now holds a farm 
under the Squire of ^500 per annum. Such things are constantly 
happening. 

" I will have no swearing. There is pleasure in a pint of ale, 
but what pleasure is there in an oath ? A swearer is a low, vulgar 
person. Swearing is fit for a tinker or a razor-grinder, not for an 
honest labourer in my parish. 

" I must positively forbid all poaching ; it is absolute ruin to 
yourself and your family. In the end you are sure to be detected, 
— a hare in one pocket and a pheasant in the other. How are you 
to pay ten pounds? You have not ten pence beforehand in the 
world. Daniel's breeches are unpaid for ; you have a hole in your 
hat, and want a new one ; your wife, an excellent woman, is about 
to lie in, — and you are, all of a sudden, called upon by the Justice 
to pay ten pounds. I shall never forget the sight of poor Cranford, 
hurried to Taunton Gaol ; a wife and three daughters on their 
knees to the Justice, who was compelled to do his duty, and commit 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 221 

him. The next day, beds, chairs, and clothes sold, to get the father 
out of gaol. Out of gaol he came ; but the poor fellow could not 
bear the sight of his naked cottage, and to see his family pinched 
with hunger. You know how he ended his days. Was there a dry 
eye in the churchyard when he was buried ? It was a lesson to 
poachers. It is indeed a desperate and foolish trade. Observe, I 
am not defending the game-laws, but I am advising you, as long 
as the game-laws exist, to fear them, and to take care that you and 
your family are not crushed by them. And, then, smart stout young 
men hate the gamekeeper, and make it a point of courage and spirit 
to oppose him. Why? The gamekeeper is paid to protect the 
game, and he would be a very dishonest man if he did not do his 
duty. What right have you to bear malice against him for this ? 
After all, the game in justice belongs to the landowners, who feed 
it ; and not to you, who have no land at all, and can feed nothing. 
" I don't like that red nose, and those blear eyes, and that stupid 
downcast look. You are a drunkard. Another pint, and one pint 
more ; a glass of gin and water, rum and milk, cider and pepper, 
a glass of peppennint, and all the beastly fluids which drunkards 
pour down their throats. It is very possible to conquer it, if you 
will but be resolute. I remember a man in Staffordshire who was 
drunk every day of his life. Every farthing he earned went to the 
alehouse. One evening he staggered home, and found at a late 
hour his wife sitting alone, and drowned in tears. He was a man 
not deficient in natural affections ; he appeared to be struck with 
the wretchedness of the woman, and with some eagerness asked her 
why she was crying. ' I don't like to tell you, James,' she said, 
' but if I must, I must ; and truth is, my children have not touched 
a morsel of anything this blessed day. As for me, never mind me ; 
I must leave you to guess how it has fared with me. But not one 
morsel of food could I beg or buy for those children that lie on that 
bed before you ; and I am sure, James, it is better for us all we 
should die, and to my soul I wish we were dead.' ' Dead ! ' said 
James, starting up as if a flash of lightning had darted upon him ; 
1 dead, Sally ! You, and Mary, and the two young ones dead ? 
Lookye, my lass, you see what I am now, — like a brute. I have 
wasted your substance, — the curse of God is upon me, — I am 
drawing near to the pit of destruction, — but there's an end ; I feel 
there ; s an end. Give me that glass, wife.' She gave it him with 
astonishment and fear. He turned it topsy-turvy ; and, striking 
the table with great violence, and flinging himself on his knees, 
made a most solemn and affecting vow to God of repentance and 
sobriety. From that moment to the day of his death he drank no 
fermented liquor, but confined himself entirely to tea and water.* 

* A fact. 



222 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

I never saw so sudden and astonishing a change. His looks 
became healthy, his cottage neat, his children were clad, his wife 
was happy ; and twenty times the poor man and his wife, with tears 
in their eyes, have told me the story, and blessed the evening of the 
fourteenth of INI arch, the day of James's restoration, and have 
shown me the glass he held in his hand when he made the vow of 
sobriety. It is all nonsense about not being able to work without 
ale, and gin, and cider, and fermented liquors. Do lions and cart- 
horses drink ale ? It is mere habit. If you have good nourishing 
food, you can do very well without ale. Nobody works hardei 
than the Yorkshire people, and for years together there are many 
Yorkshire labourers who never taste ale. I have no objection, you 
will observe, to a moderate use of ale, or any other liquor you can 
afford to purchase. My objection is, that you cannot afford it ; 
that every penny you spend at the ale-house comes out of the 
stomachs of the poor children, and strips off the clothes of the wife. 

" My dear little Nanny, don't believe a word he says. He merely 
means to ruin and deceive you. You have a plain answer to give : 
— * When I am axed in the church, and the parson has read the 
service, and all about it is written down in the book, then I will 
listen to your nonsense, and not before.' Am not I a Justice of the 
Peace, and have not I had a hundred foolish girls brought before 
me, who have all come with the same story ? — ' Please, your 
Worship, he is a false man ; he promised me marriage over and 
over again.' . I confess I have often wished for the power of hang- 
ing these rural lovers. But what use is my wishing ? All that can 
be done with the villain is to make him pay half-a-crown a week, 
and you are handed over to the poor-house, and to infamy. Will 
no example teach you ? Look to Mary Willet, — three years ago 
the handsomest and best girl in the village, now a slattern in the 
poor-house ! Look at Harriet Dobson, who trusted in the promises 
of James Harefield's son, and, after being abandoned by him, went 
away in despair with a party of soldiers ! How can you be such a 
fool as to surrender your character to the stupid flattery of a 
ploughboy ? If the evening is pleasant, the birds sing, and flowers 
bloom, is that any reason why you are to forget God's Word, the 
happiness of your family, and your own character? What is a 
woman worth without character? A profligate carpenter, or a 
debauched watchmaker, may gain business from their skill ; but 
how is a profligate woman to gain her bread ? Who will receive 
her? 

" But this is enough of my parish advice."— 

" Have you observed that nothing can be done in England with- 
out a dinner ? When first I came to Bristol, I found it was dinner all 
the day. Not the appetite of an alderman could have got through 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 223 

them, or the stomach of an ostrich digested them. ] examined 
into their objects, and found the expenses of the greater part 
exceeded the sum collected for the charities for whose benefit we 
dined. All such I refused to dine at, or subscribe to, and I dare 
say was considered a monster in consequence. However, it is 
quite true what Frere says: — 'An Englishman opens, like an 
oyster, with a knife and fork ; one never knows what is in a man 
till these two agents are in active employment.' 

"When I hear the rustics yawn audibly at my sermons, it 
reminds me of that observation of Lord Ellenborough's, who, on 

seeing Lord gape during his own long and dull speech, said, 

' Well, I must own there is some taste in that, but is not Lord 

rather encroaching on our privileges ? ' 

"It is a curious fact that the peasantry in England apply the 
masculine and feminine gender to things, like the French. My 
schoolmistress here, a very respectable young woman, hurt her leg. 
I inquired how she was, the other day ; she answered, ' He was 
very bad ; he gave her a great deal of trouble at night. ; I inquired 
who, in some surprise ; and found it was her leg. If I complain of 
want of punctuality, the servants say, ' 'Tis long of the clock, sir, 
She has gone quite wrong ; she 's always going wrong.' 

" Some of the words used by the peasantry are very expressive : 
insense, for example, is to get the sense into a man. * Well, John/ 
I sometimes say, 'have you insensed that man?' 'Yes, your 
honour ; and he teld me he could na understand your honour na 
more than if ye were a Frenchman.' " 

Some one mentioned that a young Scotchman, who had been 
lately in the neighbourhood, was about to marry an Irish widow, 
double his age and of considerable dimensions. " Going to marry 
her ! " he exclaimed, bursting out laughing ; " going to marry her ! 
impossible ! you mean, a part of her; he could not marry her all 
himself. It would be a case, not of bigamy, but trigamy ; the 
neighbourhood or the magistrates should interfere. There is 
enough of her to furnish wives for a whole parish. One man marry 
her ! — it is monstrous. You might people a colony with her ; or 
give an assembly with her ; or perhaps take your morning's walk 
round her, always provided there were frequent resting-places, and 
you were in rude health. I was once rash enough to try walking 
round her before breakfast, but only got half-way and gave it up 
exhausted. Or you might read the Riot Act and disperse her ; in 
short, you might do anything with her but marry her." " Oh, Mr 
Sydney ! " said a young lady, recovering from the general laugh, 
"did you make all that yourself?" "Yes, Lucy," throwing himself 
back in his chair and shaking with laughter, " all myself, child ; 
all my own thunder. Do you think, when I am about to make a 



224 MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 

joke, I send for my neighbours G. and G., or consult the clerk and 
churchwardens upon it ? But let us go into the garden ;" and, all 
laughing till we cried, without hats or bonnets, we sallied forth out 
of his glorified window into the garden. 

Opposite was a beautiful bank with a hanging wood of fine old 
beech and oak, on the summit of which presented themselves, to 
our astonished eyes, two donkeys, with deers' antlers fastened on 
their heads, which ever and anon they shook, much wondering at 
their horned honours ; whilst their attendant donkey-boy, in Sun- 
day garb, stood grinning and blushing at their side. " There, 

Lady ! you said the only thing this place wanted to make it 

perfect was deer ; what do you say now ? I have, you see, ordered 
my gamekeeper to drive my deer into the most picturesque point of 
view. Excuse their long ears, a little peculiarity belonging to par- 
sonic deer. Their voices, too, are singular ; but we do our best for 
you, and you are too true a friend of the Church to mention our de- 
fects." All this, of course, amidst shouts of laughter, whilst his 
own merry laugh might be heard above us all, ringing through the 
valley, and making the very echoes laugh in chorus. 

Then wandering on a little further, his black crutchstick in his 
hand, and his white hairs blown about by the soft Somersetshire 
wind : " It must be admitted," said he, " if the mind vegetates, the 
body rejoices, in the country. What an air this is ! Our climate 
is so mild, that myrtles and geraniums stand out all the winter ; 
and the effects of it on the human constitution are such, that Lady 

, a model of female virtue, who never gave that excellent 

baronet, her husband, a moment's anxiety, declared to me with a 
deep sigh, after a week's residence here, that she must go, for she 
felt all her principles melting away under its influence. Some of 
my Scotch friends, it is true, complain that it is too enervating ; but 
they are but northern barbarians, after all, and like to breathe their 
air raw. We civilised people of the south prefer it cooked." 

On observing some of the autumn crocus in flower, he stopped : 
" There !" he said, " who would guess the virtue of that little plant ? 
But I find the power of colchicum so great, that if I feel a little 
gout coming on, I go into the garden, and hold out my toe to that 
plant, and it gets well directly. I never do more without orders 
from head-quarters. Oh ! when I have the gout, I feel as if I was 
walking on my eyeballs." 

Going a few steps farther : " There, now lift your eyes, and tell 
me where another parsonage-house in England has such a view as 
that to boast of. What can Pall Mall or Piccadilly produce to 
rival it ? The church, too, which you see ; — it must be a satisfac- 
tion to your ladyship to find yourself so near the church. When 
first I came here, all that view was shut out by trees. I saw at one 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 225 

glance what was to be done. I called for Jack Spratt, my carpenter, 
and his hatchet. Saba was in tears, Mrs Sydney in hysterics, all 
the family in despair ; but I hardened my heart, Jack Spratt cut 
vigorously, at every stroke the view became more lovely, and now 
the whole family are converts and deny the tears." 

" Did you say, a Quaker baby ? Impossible ! there is no such 
thing ; there never was ; they are always born broad-brimmed and 
in full quake. . . . Well, all I can say is, I never saw one ; 
and what is still more remarkable, I never met with any one who 
had. Do you believe in it ? Lady Morley does not. Have you 
heard the report that they are fed on drab-coloured pap ? It must 
be this that gives them their beautiful complexion. I have a 
theory about them and bluecoat boys, which I will tell you some 
day." 

" Yes, it requires a long apprenticeship to speak well in the 
House of Commons. It is the most formidable ordeal in the 
world. Few men have succeeded who entered it late in life ; 
Jeffrey is perhaps the best exception. Bobus used to say that 
there was more sense and good taste in the whole House, than in 
any one individual of which it was composed." 

" We are told, ' Let not the sun go down on your wrath.' This 
of course is best ; but, as it generally does, I would add, Never act 
or write till it has done so. This rule has saved me from many an 
act of folly. It is wonderful what a different view we take of the 
same event four-and-twenty hours after it has happened." 

" Yes, I think the Duke of wore his rank most gracefully. 

I have heard that he was once mounting his horse, in company 
with the Archbishop of York, and desired the groom to let go the 
rein. The groom stupidly retained it. The nobleman snatched it 
with some violence, and, riding off, called him a fool. He had 
hardly proceeded a hundred yards, when he stopped, saying, 
' Why did I call that man a fool ? I dare say he is not so great a 
fool as I am.' He instantly turned his horse, galloped after the 
man, and made his peace with a kind word and half-a-crovvn." 

This pretty trait reminds me of what I have not unfrequently 
seen in my father, and think I may mention here ; for though it is 
not the part of a daughter to reveal faults, yet a fault nobly re- 
paired or repented of, adds to the respect and interest which a 
character inspires. My father was by nature quick and hasty, yet 
he always struggled against it ; made many regulations to avoid 
exciting such feelings ; and when he did give way, it often excited 
my admiration to see him gradually subduing his chafed spirit, 
and to observe his dissatisfaction with himself till he had humbled 
himself and made his peace, it mattered not with whom, groom or 
child. He could not bear the reproaches of his own heart. 

P 



226 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

"In this hard, rough, every-day working world, the object of 
education should not be, as it so often is, to excite and sharpen the 
acute feelings of a young person, but to calm and blunt them ; pre- 
serving only those warm and generous feelings which give strength 
and courage to perform the great duties of life." 

" Once, when talking with Lord on the subject of Bible 

names, I could not remember the name of one of Job's daughters. 
1 Kczia,' said he immediately. Surprised, I congratulated him upon 
being so well read in Bible lore. * Oh ! ' said he, ' my three grey- 
hounds are named after Job's daughters."' 

"Ah !" said my father, on taking some guests round his farm, 
"you will find it is a formidable undertaking to visit an improver ; 
we spare you nothing, from the garret to the pig-stye. It is like a 
Frenchman's explanation ; they never give you credit for knowing 
the commonest facts. C'est toujours, ' Commengons au deluge.' 
My heart sinks when a Frenchman begins, ' Mon ami, je vais 
vous expliquer tout cela.' A fellow-traveller in the diligeiice once 
explained to me how to cut a sandwich, all the way from Amiens to 
Paris." 

"Yes, he was a clever and liberal man, but his wife was a 
much more remarkable woman ; she had a truly porcelain under- 
standing." 

" True, it is most painful not to meet the kindness and affection 
you feel you have deserved and have a right to expect from others ; 
but it is a mistake to complain of it, for it is of no use : you cannot 
extort friendship with a cocked pistol." 

On some one of his guests lamenting they had left something 
behind : " Ah ! " he said, " that would not have happened if you 
had had a screaming gate." " A screaming gate ? what do you 
mean, Mr Smith ? " " Yes, everybody should have a screaming 
gate. We all arrived once at a friend's house just before dinner, 
hot, tired, and dusty, — a large party assembled, — and found all the 
keys of our trunks had been left behind ; since then I have estab- 
lished a screaming gate. We never set out on our journey now 
without stopping at a gate about ten minutes' distance from the 
house, to consider what we have left behind : the result has been 
excellent." 

11 Nothing is so tiresome to me as a person who is always talking 
Phcebuses ; I prefer plain honest dulness a thousand times." 

" Cultivate the love of reading in a young person ; it is an un- 
ceasing source of pleasure, and probably of innocence." 

Alluding to the injudicious endeavours to force religion on very 
young children : " Of this much I am sure, that the attempt to 
impress notions of religion on very young children, before they are 
capable of thinking seriously for one moment upon anything, is to 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 227 

associate, for the whole of subsequent life, ennui and disgust with 
the idea of sacred reflections ; and I am fully persuaded more in- 
jury is done by injudicious zeal than by neglect." 

" Yes, it was a mistake to write any more. He was a one-book 
man. Some men have only one book in them ; others, a library." 

" I believe one of the Duke of Wellington's earliest victories was 
at Eton, over my eldest brother, Bobus. I have heard that the 
Duke reminded him of it on seeing him accidentally in society 
many years after the Spanish campaigns." 

On meeting a young lady who had just entered the garden, and 
shaking hands with her : " I must," he said " give you a lesson in 
shaking hands, I see. There is nothing more characteristic than 
shakes of the hand. I have classified them. Lister, when he was 
here, illustrated some of them. Ask Mrs Sydney to show you his 
sketches of them when you go in. There is the high official ',—the 
body erect, and a rapid, short shake, near the chin. There is the 
mort-main, — the flat hand introduced into your palm, and hardly 
conscious of its contiguity. The digital, — one finger held out, 
much used by the high clergy. There is the shakus rusticus, where 
your hand is seized in an iron grasp, betokening rude health, warm 
heart, and distance from the metropolis ; but producing a strong 
sense of relief on your part when you find your hand released and 
your fingers unbroken. The next to this is the retentive shake, — 
one which, beginning with vigour, pauses as it were to take 
breath, but without relinquishing its prey, and before your, are 
aware begins again, till you feel anxious as to the result, and have 
no shake left in you. There are other varieties, but this is enough 
for one lesson." 

On examining some new flowers in the garden, a beautiful girl, 
who was of the party, exclaimed, " Oh, Mr Sydney ! this pea will 
never come to perfection." " Permit me, then," said he, gently 
taking her hand and walking towards the plant, " to lead perfection 
to the pea." 

" I think an office for marriage would be a very good thing. I 
am sure I could marry people much better than they marry them- 
selves ; young people are so absurd, and accept and refuse for 
such foolish reasons. I wish, Miss — — , you would employ me; 
I have succeeded admirably already on two occasions : will you 
take my advice ? " " Oh yes, Mr Sydney." " Well, then, we will 
have a little private conversation, and consider your case ; but 
now I must go and look after my parish." 

" After luncheon may I have the honour of driving you round 
my wood ?" (addressing one of the ladies). " David, bring me my 
hat." And with his crutch-stick in his hand, he sallied forth into 
his parish. My father writes, " I lay a particular stress upon vidt* 



228 MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 

ing the poor in person. He who only knows the miseries of man- 
kind at second-hand, and by description, has but a faint idea of 
what is really suffered in the world.'' He practised diligently 
what he preached, and always seemed to carry comfort and plea- 
sure into every cottage he entered, for he brought what the poor 
value so highly, and so seldom obtain — sympathy. He appeared, 
and was, interested in their concerns. When he sat down in a 
cottage, nothing escaped his eye : Solomon's Temple in rockwork, 
— the Prodigal Son on the wall, — the old woman in the ingle-nook, 
— the dirty, rosy infant on the floor, all came in for a share of his 
notice. 

" Why, John, I took you for a general officer at least, in that 
new red waistcoat ; but, John, I think there is a touch of pride in 
those brass buttons, don't you ?" " Na, your honour, there beam," 
said John, highly gratified, and grinning from ear to ear. " Well, 
and how do you do ?" to the old woman. " Oh ! the stuff your 
honour sent did me a world of good." " Ah, I thought it would 
reach the right spot, Dame ; well, then, you must send the bottle 
for some more." 

"At this time," writes Mrs Marcet, "he was in the habit of 
spending half an hour every morning with a young workman who 
was in the last stage of consumption ; ' part of that time,' he said, 
* was spent in preparing him for another world, and part in endea- 
vouring to render his last days in this as cheerful and as happy as 
he could.' He used to stop and talk to the children of the village 
as he passed along the road. He always kept a box of sugar- 
plums in his pocket for these occasions, and often some rosy-faced 
urchin was made happy by sharing its contents, or obtaining a 
penny to buy a tart. ' Let it be large and full of juice, Johnny,' 
he would say, i so that it may run down both corners of the mouth., 
Stopping another : ' What do you call me ? who am I ? ' ' Why, 
we calls you the Parson Doctor.' ' Oh, you little rogue ! ' pinching 
his cheek smilingly, and holding up his fist at him, ' I will send 
you a dose when I go home.' 

"At last he returned, and presently might be heard the cry of 
'Jack Spratt !' — a few minutes after, 'Betty Loch !' (the garden- 
woman) ; then ' Bunch !' (now converted into a cook) ; then 'Annie 
Kay !' Shortly after he would come up into the drawing-room 
with a large manuscript book in his hand, and, seating himself in 
an arm-chair, look round upon us. 'What are you reading?' 
'The Life of Franklin.' 'Oh, that is right. I recommend the 
study of Franklin to all young people ; he was a real philanthropist, 
a wonderful man. It has been said, that it was honour enough to 
any one country to have produced such a man as Franklin. I 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 229 

think all young people should read the " Spectator," too, — a papei 
a-day ; I always did.' 

" On Miss and her friend Dr 's daughter passing 

through the room, some one remarked what a pretty contrast their 

different styles of beauty made. 'Yes,' he said, 'Miss 

reminds me of a youthful Minerva ; and her friend, as Dr 's 

daughter, must be, you know, the Venus de Medicis.' 

" Talking of Switzerland : ' Well, what are they doing now in the 
irritable little republic ? They say a change in the hour of shutting 
the gates convulsed the whole canton of Geneva. Have they 

deposed M yet ? You remember 's answer, when they 

sent him a decree that he could not be permitted to fire in the 
republic ? " Very well," said he, " it makes no sort of difference 
to me ; I can very easily fire over the republic."' 

" Some one mentioning a marriage about to take place : ' Why, 
it is like the union of an acid and an alkali ; the result must be a 
Urtium quid, or neutral salt.' 

" ' What a beautiful thought ! (reading from a book in his hand :) 
a sunbeam passes through pollution unpolluted.' 

"'Ah! what female heart can withstand a red-coat? I think 
this should be a part of female education ; it is much neglected. 
As you have the rocking-horse to accustom them to ride, I would 
have military dolls in the nursery, to harden their hearts against 
officers and red-coats. I found myself in company with some 
officers at the country-house of a friend once ; and as the repast 
advanced the colonel became very eloquent, and communicated to 
us a military definition of vice and virtue. " Vice," he said, " was 
a d — d cocked-tailed fellow ; and virtue," said he (striking the table 
with his fist, to enforce the description,) " was a fellow fenced about 
for the good of the service." We all burst into such an uncontrol- 
lable paroxysm of laughter, that I began to fear the honest colonel 
might think it for the good of the service to shoot us through the 
head ; so, for the good of the Church, hastened to agree with him, 
and we parted very good friends.' 

" ' Yes, Mr has great good sense ; but I never met a manner 

more entirely without frill.' 

" Talking of Lord Denman : ' What a face he has ! how well he 
looks his part ! He is stamped by nature for a Chief-Justice. He 
is an honourable, high-minded man. I have a great respect for 
him.' 

" ' I will explain it to you,' said Mr D . ' Oh, pray don't, my 

dear D ,' said Sydney laughing ; ' I did understand a little 

about the Scotch Kirk before you undertook to explain it to me 
yesterday ; but now my mind is like a London fog on the subject' 

" ' But I came up to speak to Annie Kay. Where is Annie Kay? 



230 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Ring the bell for Annie Kay.' Kay appeared. ' Bring me my 
medicine-book, Annie Kay. Kay is my apothecary's boy, and 
makes up my medicines/ Kay appears with the book. 'lama 
great doctor; would you like to hear some of my medicines? 1 
' Oh yes, Mr Sydney.' ' There is the Gentlejog, a pleasure to take 
it, — the Bull-dog, for more serious cases, — Peter's puke, — Heart's 
delight, the comfort of all the old women in the village, — Rub-a- 
dub, a capital embrocation, — Dead-stop, settles the matter at once, 
— Up-with-it-then needs no explanation ; and so on. Now, Annie 
Kay, give Mrs Spratt a bottle of Rub-a-dub ; and to Mr Coles a 
dose of Dead-stop and twenty drops of laudanum.' 

" ' This is the house to be ill in ' (turning to us) ; ' indeed every 
body who comes is expected to take a little something ; I consider 
it a delicate compliment when my guests have a slight illness here. 
We have contrivances for everything. Have you seen my patent 
armour. No ? Annie Kay, bring my patent armour. Now, look 
here : if you have a stiff neck or swelled face, here is this sweet 
case of tin filled with hot water, and covered with flannel to put 
round your neck, and you are well directly. Likewise, a patent tin 
shoulder, in case of rheumatism. There you see a stomach-tin, the 
greatest comfort in life; and lastly,hereis a tin slipper, to be filled 
with hot water, which you can sit with in the drawing-room, should 
you come in chilled, without wetting your feet. Come and see my 
apothecary's shop.' 

" We all went downstairs, and entered a room filled entirely on 
one side with medicines, and on the other with every description of 
groceries and household or agricultural necessaries ; in the centre, 
a large chest, forming a table, and divided into compartments for 
soap, candles, salt, and sugar. 

" ' Here you see,' said he, ' every human want before you : — 

1 Man wants but little here below, 
As beef, veal, mutton, pork, lamb, venison show ; 

spreading out his arms to exhibit everything, and laughing. ' Life 
is a difficult thing in the country, I assure you, and it requires a 
good deal of forethought to steer the ship, when you live twelve 
miles from a lemon. 

" ' By the bye, that reminds me of one of our greatest domestic 

triumphs. Some years ago my friend C , the arch-epicure of 

the Northern Circuit, was dining with me in the country. On 
sitting down to dinner, he turned round to the servant, and desired 
him to look in his great-coat pocket, and he would find a lemon ; 
" For," he said, " I thought it likely you might have duck and green- 
peas for dinner, and therefore thought it prudent, at this distance 
from a town, to provide a lemon." I turned round, and exclaimed 
indignantly, " Bunch, bring in the lemon-bag ! " and Bunch ap- 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 331 

peared with a bag containing a dozen lemons. He respected us 
wonderfully after that. Oh, it is reported that he goes to bed with 
concentrated lozenges of wild- duck, so as to have the taste con- 
stantly in his mouth when he wakes in the night.' 

" ' Look here, this is a stomach-pump ; you can't die here. 
Bobus roared with laughter when I showed it to him, but I saved 
my footman's life by it.* He swallowed as much arsenic as would 
have poisoned all the rats in the House of Lords ; but I pumped 
lime-water into him night and day for many hours at a time, and 
there he is. This is my medical department. Saba used to be my 
apothecary's boy before Dr Holland carried her off ; Annie Kay is 
now promoted to it.' 

" We spent some time in examining the wonders of the shop, as 
he called it ; he showing us all sorts of contrivances and comforts 
for both rich and poor ; and, in doing so, exhibited at the same 
time that mixture of sense, nonsense, forethought, and gaiety, so 
peculiar to himself, and which gave a charm even to the details of 
a grocer's shop. We then returned to the drawing-room : in a 
short time he followed us up, with another book in his hand. 
' Mrs Sydney, I find the cook wants yeast and eggs.' ' Yes, she 
has not been able to get any.' ' Why did you not write it down in 
7ny book, then ? I always tell Mrs Sydney, when she wants any- 
thing, to write it down in my book ; once down in my book, and it 
is done directly. Look here, it is divided into different heads, — 
the carpenter, the blacksmith, the farm, the sick, the house, &c. 
&c. ; that is the way to keep house in the country. Every day I 
look through these wants, and remedy them. Now, Mrs Sydney, 
you want eggs and yeast. I will mount the boys on the ponies, 
and they shall scour the country forthwith, and you shall be sup- 
plied with yeast and eggs till you cry, Hold ! hold ! enough !' 

" Then, looking round on us : 'I wish I could sew. I believe 
one reason why women are so much more cheerful, generally, than 
men, is because they can work, and vary more their employments. 

Lady used to teach her sons carpet-work. All men ought to 

learn to sew.' 

* Literally true. The man had a passion for dough, and, returning hungry one night, 
found a lump of dough which had been prepared with arsenic for the rats, left most im- 
properly by the gardener on the kitchen dresser; and, indulging his passion, he devoured 
a considerable quantity of it. The punishment was speedy ; my father was called up, 
and, on hearing what had happened, put the stomach-pump instantly into use, and, 
turning to his medical books, applied incessantly the proper remedies all night, till the 
arrival of the medical man in the morning. The remaining dough was analysed, and I 
am afraid to state from memory the number of grains of arsenic he had swallowed. The 
medical man said, nothing but the promptness of my father's remedies could possibly 
have saved the poor man's life, which remained doubtful for many days ; and it was 
months before he recovered from its effects. But he lived to show his gratitude to his 
master by his watchful and tender care of him in his last illness. 



c 3 2 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" Speaking of manners as a part of education : ' Yes, manners 
nre often too much neglected ; they are most important to men, no 
less than to women. I believe the English are the most disagree- 
able people under the sun ; not so much because Mr John Bull 
disdains to talk, as that the respected individual has nothing to 
say, and because he totally neglects manners. Look at a French 
carter ; he takes off his hat to his neighbour carter, and inquires 
after " la saute" de madame," with a bow that would not have dis- 
graced Sir Charles Grandison ; and I have often seen a French 
soubrette with a far better manner than an English duchess. 
The true point at which a sensible girl should aim in manners is 
to be well behaved without being insipid. It is far better never- 
theless to fail in the latter than in the former point ; but life is too 
short to get over a bad manner ; besides, manners are the shadows 
of virtue/ 

" * It is astonishing the influence foolish apothegms have upon 
the mass of mankind, though they are not unfrequently fallacies. 
Here are a few I amused myself with writing, long before Ben- 
tham's book on Fallacies. 

" Fallacy I. — ' Because I have gone through it, my son shall go 
through it also! 
" A man gets well pummelled at a public school ; is subject to 
every misery and every indignity which seventeen years of age can 
inflict upon nine and ten ; has his eye nearly knocked out, and 
his clothes stolen and cut to pieces ; and twenty years afterwards, 
when he is a chrysalis, and has forgotten the miseries of his grub 
state, is determined to act a manly part in life, and says, 1 1 passed 
through all that myself, and I am determined my son shall pass 
through it as I have done ;' and away goes his bleating progeny to 
the tyranny and servitude of the long chamber or the large dormi- 
tory. It would surely be much more rational to say, ' Because I 
have passed through it, I am determined my son shall not pass 
through it ; because I was kicked for nothing, and cuffed for 
nothing, and fagged for everything, I will spare all these miseries 
to my child.' It is not for any good which may be derived from 
this rough usage ; that has not been weighed and considered ; few 
persons are capable of weighing its effects upon character ; but 
there is a sort of compensatory and consolatory notion, that the 
present generation (whether useful or not, no matter) are not to 
come off scot-free, but are to have their share of ill-usage ; as if 
the black eye and bloody nose which Master John Jackson re- 
ceived in 1800, are less black and bloody by the application of 
similar violence to similar parts of Master Thomas Jackson, the 
son, in 1830. This is not only sad nonsense, but cruel nonsense. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 233 

The only use to be derived from the recollection of what we have 
suffered in youth, is a fixed determination to screen those we edu- 
cate from every evil and inconvenience, from subjection to which 
there are not cogent reasons for submitting. Can anything be 
more stupid and preposterous than this concealed revenge upon 
the rising generation, and latent envy lest they should avail them- 
selves of the improvements time has made, and pass a happier 
youth than their fathers have done ? 



"Fallacy II.— 1 1 have said I will do it, and I will do it; I will 
stick to my word.' 
" This fallacy proceeds from confounding resolutions with pro- 
mises. If you have promised to give a man a guinea for a reward, 
or to sell him a horse or a field, you must do it ; you are dishonest 
if you do not. But if you have made a resolution to eat no meat 
for a year, and everybody about you sees that you are doing mis- 
chief to your constitution, is it any answer to say, you have said so, 
and you will stick to your word ? With whom have you made the 
contract with but yourself ? and if you and yourself, the two con- 
tracting parties, agree to break the contract, where is the evil, or 
who is injured ? 

"Fallacy IIT. — '/ object to half-measures, — it is neither one thing 
nor the other' 
"But why should it be either one thing or the other? why not 
something between both ? Why are half-measures necessarily or 
probably unwise measures? I am embarrassed in my circum- 
stances ; — one of my plans is, to persevere boldly in the same line 
of expense, and to trust to the chapter of accidents for some in- 
crease of fortune ; the other is, to retire entirely from the world, 
and to hide myself in a cottage ; — but I end with doing neither, 
and take a middle course of diminished expenditure. I do neither 
one thing nor the other, but possibly act wiser than if I had done 
either. I am highly offended by the conduct of an acquaintance ; 
I neither overlook it entirely nor do I proceed to call him out ; I 
do neither, but show him, by a serious change of manner, that I 
consider myself to have been ill-treated. I effect my object by 
half-measures. I cannot agree entirely with the Opposition or the 
Ministry ; it may very easily happen that my half-measures are 
wiser than the extremes to which they are opposed. But it is a 
sort of metaphor which debauches the understanding of foolish 
people ; and when half-measures are mentioned, they have much 
the same feeling as if they were cheated — as if they had bargained 
for a whole bushel and received but half. To act in extremes is 



234 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

sometime wisdom ; to avoid them is sometimes wisdom ; every 
measure must be judged of by its own particular circumstances." 

" ' Did you ever hear my definition of marriage ? It is, that it 
resembles a pair of shears, so joined that they cannot be separated ; 
often moving in opposite directions, yet always punishing any one 
who comes between them.' 

" Some one speaking of Macaulay : l Yes, I take great credit to 
myself; I always prophesied his greatness from the first moment 
I saw him, then a very young and unknown man, on the Northern 
Circuit. There are no limits to his knowledge, on small subjects as 
well as great ; he is like a book in breeches. . . . Yes, I agree, he is 
certainly more agreeable since his return from India. His enemies 
might perhaps have said before (though I never did so) that he 
talked rather too much ; but now he has occasional flashes of 
silence that make his conversation perfectly delightful. But 
what is far better and more important than all this is, that I believe 
Macaulay to be incorruptible. You might lay ribbons, stars, gar- 
ters, wealth, titles, before him in vain. He has an honest, genuine 
love of his country, and the world could not bribe him to neglect 
her interests.' 

" Talking of absence : ' The oddest instance of absence of mind 
happened to me once in forgetting my own name. I knocked at 

a door in London ; asked, Is Mrs B at home ? "Yes, Sir ; pray 

what name shall I say ? " I looked in the man's face astonished : 
— what name ? what name ? ay, that is the question ; what is my 
name ? I believe the man thought me mad ; but it is literally true, 
that during the space of two or three minutes I had no more idea 
who I was than if I had never existed. I did not know whether I 
was a Dissenter or a layman. I felt as dull as Sternhold and 
Hopkins. At last, to my great relief, it flashed across me that I 
was Sydney Smith.' 

" ' I heard of a clergyman who went jogging along the road till 
he came to a turnpike. "What is to pay?" "Pay, Sir? for 
what ? " asked the turnpike man. " Why, for my horse, to be 
sure." " Your horse, Sir ? what horse ? Here is no horse, Sir." 
" No horse ? God bless me ! " said he suddenly, looking down 
between his legs, " I thought I was on horseback." ' 

" ' Lord Dudley was one of the most absent men I think I ever 
met in society. One day he met me in the street, and invited me 
to meet myself. " Dine with me to-day ; dine with me, and I will 
get Sydney Smith to meet you." I admitted the temptation he held 
out to me, but said I was engaged to meet him elsewhere. An- 
other time, on meeting me, he turned back, put his arm through 
mine, muttering, " I don't mind walking with him a little way ; I'll 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 235 

walk with him as far as the end of the street." As we proceeded 

together, W passed ; " That is the villain," exclaimed he, 

" who helped me yesterday to asparagus, and gave me no toast" 
He very nearly overset my gravity once in the pulpit. He was 
sitting immediately under me, apparently very attentive, when 
suddenly he took up his stick, as if he had been in the house of 
Commons, and tapping on the ground with it, cried out in a low but 
very audible whisper, ■ Hear ! hear ! hear I" ' 

" ' By the bye, it happened to be a charity sermon, and I con- 
sidered it a wonderful proof of my eloquence, that it actually moved 

old Lady C to borrow a sovereign from Dudley, and that he 

actually gave it her, though knowing he must take a long farewell 

of it. I was told afterwards by Lady S that she rejoiced to see 

it had brought ' iron tears down Pluto's cheek' (meaning by that 
her husband), certainly little given to the melting mood in any 
sense.' 

" * One speech, I remember, of Dudley's, gratified me much. 
When I took leave of him, on quitting London to go into Yorkshire, 
he said to me, " You have been laughing at me constantly, Sydney, 
for the last seven years, and yet in all that time you never said a 
single thing to me that I wished unsaid." This, I confess, pleased 
me.* . . . But I must go and scour the country for yeast and 
eggs ;' — and off he went. 

" After luncheon appeared at the door a low green garden chair, 
holding two, and drawn by the two donkeys already introduced ; 
but despoiled, to their obvious relief, of their antlers. ' This was 
built by my village carpenter,' said he, ' but its chief merit is that 
it cannot be overturned. You need not fear my driving now ; Mrs 
Sydney will give me an excellent character. She was very much 
afraid of me when I first took to driving her in Yorkshire, but she 
raised my wages before the first month. I am become an excellent 
whip I assure you.' So saying, he mounted into the little vehicle, 
and set off with his lady at a foot's pace, we following in his train 
down the pretty valley into which the garden opened, and through 
his wood walks, till we came out upon a fine table-land above the 
house commanding a splendid view of the fine range of the 
Ouantoc Hills on the one side, and the rich Vale of Taunton on 
the other. 

" ' There :' said he, ■ behold all the wonders of the world beneath 

* It is most gratifying to find how often this delicate use of his great powers of wit and 
sarcasm is alluded to by his friends and acquaintance in the papers entrusted to me. I 
see it is said of him, in one of the publications, at his death: — " It is a rare distinction, 
but one which ought to be written on his monument, that while he wasted no gift of 
those so liberally bestowed upon him, in ministering to the unworthy pleasures of 
others, or in promoting his own selfish aggrandisement, — as a wit he was more beloved 
than feared." 



*36 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

you ! can anything be more exquisite, more beautiful ? I often come 
up here to meditate. I think of building a Gazebo here. The 
landscape is perfect ; it wants nothing but water and a wise man. 
I think it was Jckyll who used to say, that " the further he went 
west, the more convinced he felt that the wise men did come from 
the east.'" We have not such an article. You might ride from the 
rising up of the sun until the going down thereof in these regions, 
and not find one (I mean a real philosopher) whom you would con- 
sult on the great affairs of life. We are thoroughly primitive ; 
agriculture and agricultural tools are fifty years behind the rest of 
England. 

" ' A neighbouring squire called on me the other day, and in- 
formed me he had been reading a delightful book. The fact of 
his having any literary pursuits at all was equally agreeable and 
surprising to me, and I inquired the subject of his studies. " Oh ! " 
said he, " the Arabian Night's Entertainments ; I have just got it, 
and I advise you to read it. I assure you, Mr Smith, you will find 
it a most amusing book." I thanked him, cordially agreed with 
him, but ventured to suggest that the book was not entirely un- 
known to me.' 

" ' A joke goes a great way in the country. I have known one 
last pretty well for seven years. I remember making a joke after a 
meeting of the clergy, in Yorkshire, where there was a Rev. Mr 
Buckle, who never spoke when I gave his health ; saying, that he 
was a buckle without a tongue. Most persons within hearing 
laughed, but my next neighbour sat unmoved and sunk in thought. 
At last, a quarter of an hour after we had all done, he suddenly 
nudged me, exclaiming, " I see now what you meant, Mr Smith ; 
you meant a joke." " Yes," I said, " Sir ; I believe I did." Upon 
which he began laughing so heartily, that I thought he would choke, 
and was obliged to pat him on the back.' 

" Talking of the singular degree of obstinacy of Miss , on the 

most difficult and doubtful subjects, ' Oh ! nothing but a surgical 
operation will avail ; it must be cut out of her.' 

" ' I see you will not believe it, but I was once very shy.' ( Were 
you indeed, Mr Smith ? how did you cure yourself.' ' Why it was 
not very long before I made two very useful discoveries ; first, that 
all mankind were not solely employed in observing me (a belief 
that all young people have) ; and next, that shamming was of no 
use ; that the world was very clear-sighted, and soon estimated a 
man at his just value. This cured me, and I determined to be 
natural, and let the world find me out.' 

" ' Oh yes ! we both talk a great deal, but I don't believe Mac- 
aulay ever did hear my voice,' he exclaimed, laughing. ' Sometimes, 
when I have told a good story, I have thought to myself, Poor 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 237 

Macaulay ! he will be very sorry some day to have missed hearing 
that.' 

" ' Other rules vary ; this is the only one you will find without 
exception, — that, in this world, the salary or reward is always in 
&he inverse ratio of the duties performed.' 

" Some one speaking of Mr Grenville : ' I always feel better for 
being in Mr Grenville's company ; it is a beautiful sunset. You 
know the man in a regiment who is selected to stand out before 
them as their model ; he is called the fugleman. Now, Mr Gren- 
ville I always consider as the fugleman of old age. He has con- 
trived to combine the freshness and greeness of mind belonging to 
youth, with the dignity and wisdom of age.' 

" Some one wondering at his praises of , and telling Sydney 

that he often abused him : ' Oh ! ' said my father, laughing, ' I 
know he does not spare me, but that is no reason I should not 
praise him. At all times I had rather be the ox than the butcher? 

" Talking of Sheridan : ' Creevy told me, once, when dining with 
Sheridan, after the ladies had departed, he drew the chair to the 
fire, and confided to Creevy that they had just had a fortune left 
them. " Mrs Sheridan and I," said he ; " have made the solemn 
vow to each other to mention it to no one, and nothing induces me 
now to confide it to you but the absolute conviction that Mrs 
Sheridan is at this moment confiding it to Mrs Creevy up-stairs." 
Soon after this I went to visit him in the country with a large 
party ; he had taken a villa. No expense was spared ; a magnifi- 
cent dinner, excellent wines, but not a candle to be had to go to 
bed by in the house ; in the morning no butter appeared, or was to 
be procured for breakfast. He said, it was not a butter country, he 
believed. But with Sheridan for host, and the charm of his wit and 
conversation, who cared for candles, butter, or anything else ? In 
the evening there was a quarrel amongst the fiddlers, they abso- 
lutely refusing to play with a blind fiddler, who had unexpectedly 
arrived and insisted upon performing with them. He turned out 
at last to be Mathews ; his acting was quite inimitable.' 

" This brought us home again. Meeting at the door his grand- 
son, returning quite exhausted with a prodigious walk : ' Oh, fool- 
ish boy ! remember, head for glory, feet for use.' 

" He then left us, and might be seen in his pretty library ; some- 
times in his arm-chair, seated with books of different kinds piled 
round him, some grave, some gay, as his humour varied from hour 
to hour. And this rapid change of mood, which I see his friend 
Mr Moore remarks upon, was one thing amongst many which gave 
such freshness and raciness to his conversation : you never could 
guess what would come next. At other times seated at a large 
table in the bay-window, with his desk before him — on one end of 



2& MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

this tabic a case, something like a small deal music-stand, filled 
with manuscript books -on the other a large deal tray, filled with 
a leaden ink-stand, containing ink enough for a county; a magni- 
fying glass ; a carpenter's rule ; several large steel pens, which it 
was high treason to touch ; a glass bowl full of shot and water, to 
clean these precious pens ; and some red tape, which he called 
'one of the grammars of life ;' a measuring line, and various other 
articles, more useful than ornamental. At this writing establish- 
ment, unique of its kind, he could turn his mind with equal facility, 
in company or alone, to any subject, whether of business, study, 
politics, instruction, or amusement, and move the minds of his 
hearers to laughter or tears at his pleasure." 

He used to say he never considered his education finished. To 
the last years of his life, he kept up his classical studies, his reading 
and analysis of the Bible (of which I find notes in his papers), and 
profane and ecclesiastical history, from which he frequently put 
down hints, some of which I have given. He was also very fond 
of exercising himself in translating English into French, which he 
spoke with great fluency, but did not write correctly. He fre- 
quently interrupted these pursuits by issuing forth into his gay 
garden, to take a stroll round it by himself, stopping at intervals, 
with his crutch-stick swung behind him, as usual, as if meditating 
on the subject of his studies ; or sometimes sitting down on the 
lawn to watch or join in the gambols of his little grandchildren, or 
to comfort them in some childish affliction, in which the never- 
failing sugar-plum box was found a most useful assistant ; some- 
times in conference with Jack Spratt or Annie Kay on some 
domestic concern. When we met at dinner, he was, if possible, 
more agreeable than he had been during the day. tf Sydney's wit," 
as was happily said of him by Mr Howard, " is always fresh ; you 
find the dew still on it." It is remarked of him somewhere that 
" he had the power of breathing the breath of life into a dead 
truism ; everything coming from his mind seemed to be original, 
even when it was old." 

One of his most intimate friends writes of him : — " It is quite ex- 
traordinary how different every word that drops from Sydney's pen 
is from anything else in the world. Individuality is stamped on 
every sentence, and you can hardly read a page without coming to 
some sentence that no other man could have written. It was the 
same with his conversation." And again I see it said of him, 
" His power of bringing together and harmonising the most con- 
trary ideas was extraordinary : the strangeness as well as aptness 
of his similitudes, the rapidity of his changes, the readiness of his 
rejoinders, and his felicity of expression, were all perfect. His wit 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 239 

was never the result of labour, and needed no preparation ; it was 
ever fresh and flowing : he had no need to be sparing, or to keep 
it for state occasions, and it amused himself as well as his hearers." 
It signified not what the materials were : I never remember a 
dull dinner in his company.* He extracted amusement from every 
subject, however hopeless. He descended and adapted himself to 
the meanest capacity, without seeming to do so ; he led without 
seeking to lead ; he never sought to shine — the light appeared be- 
cause he could not help it. Nobody felt excluded. He had the 
happy art of always saying the best thing in the best manner to the 
right person at the right moment; it was a touch-and-go impossible 
to describe, guided by such tact and attention to the feelings of 
others, that those he most attacked seemed most to enjoy the 
attack: never in the same mood for two minutes together, and each 
mood seemed to be more agreeable than the last. " I talk a little 
sometimes," said he, " and it used to be an amusement amongst 
the servants at the Archbishop of York's, to snatch away my plate 
when I began talking ; so I got a habit of holding it with one hand 
when so engaged, and dining at single anchor." 

" Now, I mean not to drink one drop of wine to-day, and I shall 
be mad with spirits. I always am when I drink no wine. It is 
curious the effect a thimbleful of wine has upon me ; I feel as flat 

as 's jokes ; it destroys my understanding : I forget the number 

of the muses, and think them thirty-nine of course ; and only get 
myself right again by repeating the lines, and finding c Descend, ye 
thirty-nine ! ' two feet two long." 

" Oh, Saba carves for me. I always tell her I shall cut her off 
with a shilling if she ever asks me to help her to a dish before me. 
It is quite a pleasure to see her carve." 

"That pudding! yes, that was the pudding Lady Holland asked 
the recipe for when she came to see us. I shook my head, and 
said it could not be done, even for her ladyship. She became 
more urgent; Mrs Sydney was soft-hearted, and gave it. The 
glory of it almost turned my cook's head ! she has never been the 
same since. But our forte in the culinary line is our salads : I 
pique myself on our salads. Saba always dresses them after my 
recipe. I have put it into verse. Taste it, and, if you like it, I will 
give it you. I was not aware how much it had contributed to my 
reputation, till I met Lady - — at Bowood, who begged to be in- 
troduced to me, saying, she had so long wished to know me. I 
was of course highly flattered, till she added, ' For, Mr Smith, I 
hare heard so much of your recipe for salads, that I was most 

* My poor mother felt the change so strongly after his death that, on dining out for 
the first time alone, she said, " Everybody seemed to her so unusually flat, that she 
thought they must all have suffered some severe loss." 



240 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

anxious to obtain it from you.' Such and so various are the 
sources of fame ! 

" To make this condiment, your poet begs 
The pounded yellow of two hard-boil'd eggs ; 
Two boil'd potatoes, pass'd through kitchen sieve, 
Smoothness and softness to the salad give, 
Let onion atoms lurk within the bowl, 
And, half-suspected, animate the whole. 
Of mordant mustard add a single spoon, 
Distrust the condiment that bites so soon ; 
But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault, 
To add a double quantity of salt; 
Four times the spoon with oil from Lucca brown, 
And twice with vinegar procured from town ; 
And, lastly, o'er the flavoured compound toss 
A magic soupcon of anchovy sauce. 
Oh, green and glorious 1 Oh, herbaceous treat ! 
'Twould tempt the dying anchorite to eat : 
Back to the world he'd turn his fleeting soul, 
And plunge his fingers in the salad-bowl ! 
Serenely full, the epicure would say, 
Fate cannot harm me, I have dined to-day." 

" Mrs Sydney was dreadfully alarmed about her side-dishes the 
first time Luttrell paid us a visit, and grew pale as the covers were 
lifted ; but they stood the test. Luttrell tasted and praised. He 
spent a week with us, and having associated him only with Pall 
Mall, I confess I was agreeably surprised to find how pleasant an 
inmate he made of a country-house ; and almost of a family party ; 
so light in hand, so willing to be pleased. Some of his Irish 
stories, too, were most amusing, and his manner of telling them so 
good. One: 'Is your master at home, Paddy?' l No, your 
honour.' ' Why, I saw him go in five minutes ago.' ' Faith, your 
honour, he's not exactly at home ; he's only there in the back-yard 
a-shooting rats with cannon, your honour, for his devarsion? 

" A school examination, too : the children were asked what the 
first woman was made of. A general burst of ' Ribs of ?non I ribs 
of monP 'And what was the first man made of?' 'Boost and 
ashes ! doost and ashes ! ' was the reply. After this trial of us, he 
repeated his visits several times, and we found him a most 
agreeable inmate. 

" Oh, don't tell me of facts, I never believe facts : you know 
Canning said nothing was so fallacious as facts, except figures." 

" My friend Ord's place is the last spot in England : all beyond 
is chaos." 

" That is a fine idea of Clarke's :— ' The frost is God's plough, 
which He drives through every inch of ground in the world, opening 
each clod and pulverising the whole.' " 

" When some one asked what could induce the Ministry to send 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 241 

Lord M to Ireland and Lord C to Scotland, Jekyll said, 

' Oh, it is only the doctor who has put wrong labels on them by 
mistake.' The apothecaries' boys in London do this on purpose, 
and change the labels for their amusement : so Lady F. takes 
Lord D.'s embrocation, and Lord D. rubs his leg with her draught : 
but the most remarkable part of it all is, that it answers just as well 
as if the labels had been left." 

" I once dissuaded a youth from entering the army, on which he 
was bent, at the risk of breaking his mother's heart, by asking him 
how he would prevent his sword from getting between his legs. It 
quite staggered him ; he never solved the difficulty, and took to 
peace instead of war." 

" I agree with Sir James Mackintosh, and have found the world 
more good and more foolish than I thought when young." 

" It is an unlucky book ; — fine sentiments fined down till you 
can't see them ; encouraging young ladies in dangerous imaginings 
of what is not ; of an exquisite fellow bursting with sentiment, only 
he is in the moon and can't be reached. I will, I think, write an 
opposition hero, who shall be the antidote." 

" The most promising sign in a boy is, I should say, mathe- 
matics." 

" Madame de Sevigne I think much overpraised ; everybody 
writes as well now. Lady Mary Wortley wrote much better, sound 
sense. Twelve volumes of pretty turns are too much." 

" Ah, you always detect a little of the Irish fossil, the potato, 
peeping out in an Irishman." 

Some one, speaking of missions, ridiculed them as inefficient. 
My father dissented, saying, that " though all was not done that 
was projected, or even boasted of, yet that much good resulted ; 
and that wherever Christianity was taught, it brought with it the 
additional good of civilisation in its train, and men became better 
carpenters, better cultivators, better everything." 

" Have you heard my parody on Pope ? — 

" Why has not man a collar and a log? 
For this plain reason — man is not a dog. 
Why is not man served up with sauce in dish ? 
For this plain reason — man is not a fish. 

There are a great many other whys, but I will spare you." 

" Was not very disagreeable ? ' Why, he was as disagreeable 

as the occasion would permit,' Luttrell said." 

" Nobody was more witty or more bitter than Lord Ellenborough. 
A young lawyer, trembling with fear, rose to make his first speech, 
and began : ' My lord, my unfortunate client — My lord, my un- 
fortunate client — My lord' — ' Go on, Sir, go on/ said Lord E.; 
'as far as you have proceeded hitherto, the Court is entirely with 

Q 



242 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

you.' This v. as perhaps irresistible ; but yet, how wicked ! how 
cruel ! it deserves a thousand years' punishment at least." 

" Luttrell used to say, * I hate the sight of monkeys; they remind 
me so of poor relations."' 

" Oh, those sisters were all so beautiful, that Paris could 
not have decided between them, but would have cut his apple til 
slices." 

" When I went into Rundell and Bridges', there were heaps of 
diamonds lying loose about the counter. I never saw so many 
temptations, and so little apparent watchfulness. I thought there 
were many sops, and no Cerberus. But they told me, when I asked, 
that there were unseen eyes directed upon me in every part of the 
shop." 

Speaking of Lady Murray's mother, who had a most benevolent 
countenance : " Her smile is so radiant, that I believe it would force 
even a gooseberry bush into flower." 

Some young person, answering on a subject in discussion, " I 
don't know that, Mr Smith," he said, smiling, "Ah ! what you don't 
know would make a great book." 

" I never go to tragedies, my heart is too soft. There is too much 
real misery in life. But what a face she had ! The gods do not 
bestow such a face as Mrs Siddons' on the stage more than once 
in a century. I knew her very well, and she had the good taste to 
laugh heartily at my jokes ; she was an excellent person, but she 
was not remarkable out of her profession, and never got out of 
tragedy even in common life. She used to stab the potatoes ; and 
said, ' Boy, give me a knife ! ' as she would have said, ' Give me the 
dagger ! ' 

" Oh, Mrs Sydney believes it is all true ; and when I went with 
her formerly to the play, I was always obliged to sit behind her, 
and whisper, ' Why, Kate, he is not really going to kill her, — she is 
not really dead, you know ; ' or she would have cried her eyes out 
and gone into hysterics." 

" All gentlemen and ladies eat too much. I made a calculation, 
and found I must have consumed some waggon-loads too much in 
the course of my life. Lock up the mouth, and you have gained 
the victory. I believe our friend, Lady Morley, has hit upon the 
right plan, in dining modestly at two. When we are absorbed in 
side-dishes, and perplexed with variety of wines, she sits amongst 
us, lightly flirting with a potato, in full possession of her faculties, 
and at liberty to make the best use of them, — a liberty, it must be 
owned, she does not neglect, for how agreeable she is ! I like Lady 
Morley; she is what I call good company? 

" Never was known such a summer as this ; water is selling at 
threepence a pint. My cows drink beer, my horses ale." 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 243 

" The French certainly understand the art of furnishing better 
than we do ; the profusion of glass in their rooms gives such gaiety. 
I remember entering a room with glass all round it, at the French 
Embassy, and saw myself reflected on every side. I took it for a 
meeting of the clergy, and was delighted of course." 

" In composing, as a general rule, run your pen through every 
other word you have written ; you have no idea what vigour it will 
give your style." 

Speaking of heroism : " I have always said that the heroism and 
courage of men is nothing in comparison with these qualities as they 
are developed in women. Women cannot face danger accompanied 
with noise, and smoke, and hallooing ; but in all kinds of serene 
peril and quiet horror they have infinitely more philosophical en- 
durance than men. Put a woman in a boat on a boisterous sea ; 
let six or seven people make as much noise as they can, and she is 
in a state of inconceivable agony. Ask this same woman, in a 
serene summer's evening, when all nature is at rest, to drink a cup 
of poison for some good which would accrue from it to her husband 
and children, and she will swallow it like green tea." 

Addressing an idle correspondent : " I know (or rather, did 
know) the pangs of letter-writing ; but now I am arrived at a toler- 
able fluency in written nonsense, and will not scold you." 

The conversation turning on , I forget who, it was said so 

well, " There is the same difference between their tongues as 
between the hour and* the minute hand ; one goes ten times as fast, 
and the other signifies ten times as much." 

" I think no house is well fitted up in the country without people of 
all ages. There should be an old man or woman to pet ; a parrot, 
a child, a monkey : — something, as the French say, to love and to 
despise. I have just bought a parrot, to keep my servants in good 
humour." 

"No, I don't like dogs ; I always expect them to go mad. A 
lady asked me once for a motto for her dog Spot. I proposed, 
1 Out, damned Spot !' but strange to say, she did not think it senti- 
mental enough. You remember the story of the French marquise, 
who, when her pet lap-dog bit a piece out of her footman's leg, 
exclaimed, ' Ah, poor little beast ! I hope it won't make him sick.' 

I called one day on Mrs , and her lap-dog flew at my leg and 

bit it. After pitying her dog, like the French marquise, she did all 
she could to comfort me, by assuring me the dog was a Dissenter, 
and hated the Church, and was brought up in a Tory family. But 
whether the bite came from madness or Dissent, I knew myself too 
well to neglect it ; and went on the instant to a surgeon and had it 
cut out, making a mem. on the way to enter that house no more." 

" If you want to make much of a small income, always ask your- 



244 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

self these two questions : — first, do I really want it ? secondly, can 
I do without it ? These two questions, answered honestly, will 
double your fortune. I have always inculcated it in my family." 

" Lady is a remarkably clever, agreeable woman, but Nature 

has made one trifling omission — a heart ; I do like a little heart, I 
must confess." 

" I never was asked in all my life to be a trustee or an executor. 
No one believes that I can be a plodding man of business, as 
mindful of its dry details as the gravest and most stupid man 
alive." 

" I have heard that one of the American ministers in this country 
was so oppressed by the numbers of his countrymen applying for 
introductions, that he was obliged at last to set up sham Sydney 
Smiths and false Macaulays. But they can't have been good 
counterfeits ; for a most respectable American, on his return home, 
was heard describing Sydney Smith as a thin, grave, dull, old 
fellow ; and as to Macaulay (said he), I never met a more silent 
man in all my life ! " 

Talking of Mrs : " She has not very clear ideas, though, 

about the tides. I remember, at a large party at House, her 

insisting that it was always high tide at London Bridge at twelve 
o'clock. She referred to me : ' Now, Mr Smith, is it not so ?' I 
answered, ' It used not to be so, I believe, formerly, but perhaps 
the Lord Mayor and Aldermen have altered it lately.' " 

" Mr once came to see us in Yorkshire ; and he was so 

small and so active, he looked exactly like a little spirit running 
about in a kind of undress without a body." 

Speaking of a robbery : " It is Bacon, I think, who says so 
beautifully, ' He that robs in darkness breaks God's lock.' How 
fine that is ! " 

Of Mr : " Yes, I honour him for his talents and character, 

and his misfortunes have softened the little asperities of his manner, 
and made him much more agreeable. Tears are the waters of the 
heart." 

" People complain of their servants : I never had a bad one ; 
but then I study their comforts, that is one recipe for securing good 
servants." * 

" Dante, in his ' Purgatorio,' would have assigned five hundred 

years of assenting to , and as many to of praising his 

fellow-creatures." 

" I have divided mankind into classes. There is the Noodle, — 
very numerous, but well known. The Affliction-woman, — a valu- 
able member of society, generally an ancient spinster, or distant 
relation of the family, in small circumstances : the moment she 

* He hardly ever lost a servant but from marriage or death. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 245 

hears of any accident or distress in the family, she sets off, packs 
up her little bag, and is immediately established there, to comfort, 
flatter, fetch, and carry. The Up-takers, — a class of people who 
only see through their fingers' ends, and go through a room taking 
up and touching everything, however visible and however tender. 
The Clearers, — who begin at the dish before them, and go on 
picking or tasting till it is cleared, however large the company, 
small the supply, and rare the contents. The Sheep-walkers, — 
those who never deviate from the beaten track, who think as their 
fathers have thought since the flood, who start from a new idea as 
they would from guilt. The Lemon-squeezers of society, — people 
who act on you as a wet-blanket, who see a cloud in the sunshine, 
the nails of the coffin in the ribbons of the bride, predictors of evil, 
extinguishers of hope ; who, where there are two sides, see only 
the worst, — people whose very look curdles the milk, and sets your 
teeth on edge. The Let-well-aloners, — cousins-german to the 
Noodle, yet a variety ; people who have begun to think and to 
act, but are timid, and afraid to try their wings, and tremble at 
the sound of their own footsteps as they advance, and think it 
safer to stand still. Then the Washerwomen, — very numerous, 
who exclaim, ' Well ! as sure as ever I put on my best bonnet, 
it is certain to rain,' &c. There are many more, but I forget them. 

rt Oh, yes ! there is another class, as you say ; people who are 
always treading on your gouty foot, or talking in your deaf ear, or 
asking you to give them something with your lame hand, stirring 
up your weak point, rubbing your sore, &c." 

On joining us in the drawing-room, and sitting down to the 
tea-table : " Thank God for tea ! What would the world do with- 
out tea ? how did it exist ? I am glad I was not born before tea. 
I can drink any quantity when I have not tasted wine ; otherwise 
I am haunted by blue-devils by day, and dragons by night. If you 
want to -improve your understanding, drink coffee. Sir James 
Mackintosh used to say, he believed the difference between one 
man and another was produced by the quantity of coffee he 
drank." 

" O'Connell presented me to the Irish members as the powerful 
and entertaining advocate of the Irish Catholic claims." 

Talking of the ardour of country gentlemen for preserving game : 
" I believe would die for his game. He is truly a pheasant- 
minded man ; he revenged himself upon me by telling all the Joe 
Millers he could find as my jokes." 

" Oh, the Dean of deserves to be preached to death by wild 

curates." 

" The advice I sent to the Bishop of New Zealand, when he had 
to receive the cannibal chiefs there, was to say to them, ' I deeply 



346 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

regret, Sirs, to have nothing on my own table suited to your tastes, 
but you will find plenty of cold curate and roasted clergyman on 
the sideboard ; ' and if, in spite of this prudent provision, his visitors 
should end their repast by eating him likewise, why I could only 
add, ' I sincerely hoped he would disagree with them.' In this 
last sentiment he must cordially have agreed with me ; and, upon 
the whole, he must have considered it a useful hint, and would take 
it kindly. Don't you think so ?" 

" I am old, but I certainly have not that sign of old age, extol- 
ling the past at the expense of the present. On the contrary, the 
progress of the world in the last fifty years almost takes my breath 
away. Steam and electricity have advanced it beyond the dreams 
of the wildest visionary two hundred years ago. By the bye, on 
the subject of steam, I have a most curious letter, which I extracted 
from a periodical, and will show you ; it struck me as so interest- 
ing, that I made inquiries about it from the author of the publics 
tion, and have some reason to believe it is authentic. 

Letter of Marion de Lorme to the Marquis de Cinq-Mars. 

Paris, February -, 1641. 
" My dear Effiart, 

* While you are forgetting me at Narbonne, and giving yourself 
up to the pleasures of the Court, and the delight of thwarting M; le 
Cardinal de Richelieu, I, according to your express desire, am doing 
the honours of Paris to your English Lord the Marquis of Worces- 
ter ; and I carry him about, or rather he carries me, from curioshy 
to curiosity, choosing always the most grave and serious, speaking 
little, listening with extreme attention, and fixing on those whom 
he interrogates two large blue eyes, which seem to pierce to the very 
centre of their thoughts. He is remarkable for never being satis- 
fied with any explanations which are given him, and he never sees 
things in the light in which they are shown to him ; you may 
judge of this by a visit we made together to Bicetre, where he 
imagined he had discovered a genius in a madman. 

" If this madman had not been actually raving, I verily believe 
your Marquis would have entreated his liberty, and have carried 
him off to London, in order to hear his extravagances from morn- 
ing till night, at his ease. We were crossing the court of the mad- 
house, and I, more dead than alive with fright, kept close to my 
companion's side, when a frightful face appeared behind some 
immense bars, and a hoarse voice exclaimed, ' I am not mad ! I 
am not mad ! I have made a discovery which would enrich the 
country that adopted it' ' What has he discovered ? ' asked our 
guide. i Oh ! ' he answered, shrugging his shoulders, c something 
trifling enough : you would never guess it ; it is the use of the steam 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 247 

of boiling water.' I began to laugh. ' This man,' continued the 
keeper, * is named Salomon de Caus ; he came from Normandy 
four years ago, to present to the King a statement of the wonder- 
derful effects that might be produced from his invention. To listen 
to him. you would imagine that with steam you could navigate 
ships, move carriages ; in fact, there is no end to the miracles 
which, he insists upon it, could be performed. The Cardinal sent 
the madman away without listening to him. Salomon de Caus, far 
from being discouraged, followed the Cardinal wherever he went 
with the most determined perseverance, who, tired of finding him 
for ever in his path, and annoyed at his folly, shut him up in 
Bicetre, where he has now been for three years and a half, and 
where, as you hear, he calls out to every visitor that he is not mad, 
but that he has made a valuable discovery. He has even written 
a book on the subject, which I have here.' * 

" Lord Worcester, who had listened to this account with much 
interest, after reflecting a time, asked for the book, of which, after 
having read several pages, he said, ' This man is not mad ; in my 
country, instead of shutting him up, he would have been rewarded. 
Take me to him, for I should like to ask him some questions.' He 
was accordingly conducted to his cell ; but, after a time, he came 
back sad and thoughtful. - He is indeed mad now/ said he ; * misfor- 
tune and captivity have alienated his reason; but it is you who have to 
answer for his madness ; when you cast him into that cell, you con- 
fined the greatest genius of the age.' After this we went away, and 
since that time he has done nothing but talk of Salomon de Caus." 

" I destroy, on principle, all letters to me, but I have no secrets 
myself. I should not care if almost every word I have written were 
published at Charing Cross. I live with open windows." 

" This is a noble description of God's omnipresence (turning over 
the leaves of a book), ' His centre is everywhere, His circumference 
is nowhere,' " 

Talking of New Year's Day and Christmas : " No, the return of 
those fixed periods always makes me melancholy. I am glad when 
we have fairly turned the corner, and started afresh. I feel, like 
my friend Mackintosh, * there is another child of Time lost/ as the 
year departs. 

" What a loss you had in not knowing Mackintosh ! how was it? 
. . . Yes, his manner was cold ; his shake of the hand came under 
the genus ' mort-main ; ' but his heart was overflowing with bene- 
volence. I like that simile I made on him in my letter, of * a great 
ship cutting its cable;' — it is fine, and it well described Mackintosh. 

* This book is entitled, ' Les Raisons des Forces mouvantes, avec diverses machine* 
tant utiles que puissantes.' Pub. 1615, in folio.) 



248 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

His chief foible was indiscriminate praise. I amused myself the 
other day," said he, laughing, " in writing a termination of a speech 
for him ; would you like to hear it ? I will read it to you : — 

"'It is impossible to conclude these observations without ex- 
pressing the obligations I am under to a person in a much more 
humble scene of life, — I mean, Sir, the hackney-coachman by whom 
I have been driven to this meeting. To pass safely through the 
streets of a crowded metropolis must require, on the part of the 
driver, no common assemblage of qualities. He must have caution 
without timidity, activity without precipitation, and courage without 
rashness ; he must have a clear perception of his object, and a 
dexterous use of his means. I can safely say of the individual in 
tniestion, that, for a moderate reward, he has displayed unwearied 
skill ; and to him I shall never forget that I owe unfractured 
integrity of limb, exemption from pain, and perhaps prolongation 
of existence. 

" ' Nor can I pass over the encouraging cheerfulness with which 
! was received by the waiter, nor the useful blaze of light communi- 
cated by the link-boys, as I descended from the carriage. It was 
with no common pleasure that I remarked in these men, not the 
mercenary bustle of venal service, but the genuine effusions of un- 
tutored benevolence : not the rapacity of subordinate agency, but 
the alacrity of humble friendship. What may not be said of a 
country where all the little accidents of life bring forth the hidden 
qualities of the heart, — where her vehicles are driven, her streets 
illumined^ and her bells answered, by men teeming with all the 
refinements of civilised life ? 

" ' I cannot conclude, Sir, without thanking you for the very clear 
and distinct manner in which you have announced the proposition 
on which we are to vote. It is but common justice to add, that 
public assemblies rarely witness articulation so perfect, language 
so select, and a manner so eminently remarkable for everything 
that is kind, impartial, and just.' ,; * 

At ten we always went down-stairs to prayers, in the library. 
Immediately, if we were alone, appeared the " farmer" at the door, 
Jantern in hand. " David, bring me my coat and stick;" and off 
he set with him, summer and winter, to visit his horses, and see 
that they were all well fed, and comfortable in their regions for the 
night. He kept up this custom all his life. 

On returning to the drawing-room, he usually asked for a little 
music. " If I were to begin life again, I would devote much time 

* This trifling critique on his old friend, good-humoured as it is, I should not have 
given without the permission of his family, who knew that Sir James, had he seen it, 
would have been the first to smile at it. I ought to add, that the same kind indulgence 
has been granted me wherevei I have ventured on any anecdote that I feared might 
give pain. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 249 

to music. All musical people seem to me happy ; it is the most 
engrossing pursuit ; almost the only innocent and unpunished 
passion. 

" Never give way to melancholy : nothing encroaches more ; I 
fight against it vigorously.* One great remedy is, to take short 
views of life. Are you happy now ? Are you likely to remain so till 
this evening ? or next week ? or next month ? or next year ? Then 
why destroy present happiness by distant misery, which may never 
come at all, or you may never live to see it ? for every substantial 
grief has twenty shadows, and most of them shadows of your own 
making." 

Speaking of : " It was a beautiful old age; how fine those 

lines of Waller are — 

' The soul's dark cottage, batter' d and decay'd, 
Let in new lights through chinks that Time has made 1 ' " 

" Yes ; was merry, not wise. You know, a man of small 

understanding is merry where he can, not where he should. 
Lightning must, I think, be the wit of heaven." 

Mr P said to him, " I always write best with an amanuensis." 

" Oh ! but are you quite sure he puts down what you dictate, my 
dear P.?" 

Speaking of a Revolutionist : " No man, I fear, can effect great 
benefits for his country without some sacrifice of the minor 
virtues." 

" I often think what a different man I might have been if, like 
my friend Lord Holland, and others, I had had the advantage of 
passing my life with all that is most worth seeing and hearing in 
Europe, instead of being confined through the greater part of it to 
the society of the parish-clerk. I always feel when conversing 
that it is combating with unequal weapons; but I have made a 
tolerable fight of it, nevertheless. I am rather an admirer of 
O'Connell : he, it cannot be denied, has done a great deal for 
Ireland, and, on the whole, I believe he meant well ; but ' hell/ as 
Johnson says, 'is paved with good intentions. '" 

A little more of such talk, intermixed with those brilliant and 
amusing bursts of humour and attack, — which I see prettily 
compared, in one of the printed sketches of him, to "summer 
lightning, that never harmed the object illumined by its flash,"— 
and then to bed; and all was quiet, and at peace, in the little 
parsonage. 



I have endeavoured here, — partly from recollection, partly from 

* Yet I see, in his note-book, — "I wish I were of a more sanguine temperament; I 
always anticipate the worst." 



250 MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH, 

my own and my friends' notes, — to give some faint idea of the style 
of my father's conversation and his manner of living with his 
family and friends. I flatter myself, by those who knew him 
intimately, it will not be thought an unfaithful copy. But, alas ! 
without the look, the voice, the manner, the laugh, the thousand 
little delicate touches, the quick repartee, the connecting links 
from which these observations sprang, — without the master-spirit's 
voice to animate the whole, — without all this, I feel it is but a body 
without a soul. Yet, body as it is, to me it is most precious, as all 
that now remains to me of my father ; and I would fain believe 
there are a few still alive who will accept this relic of a great man 
gone, with gratitude, — will live with him again in these pages, — 
will be reminded, by them, of him as he really was, and not as I 
have here imperfectly attempted to describe him. 



CHAPTER XII. 

Extract from Lady 's Journal — Last Illness — Comes to Town — Dr Chambers called 

in — Anxiety of Friends for his recovery — Meeting of Brothers — Living presented to 
a poor Clergyman — Death of Sydney Smith — Death of his eldest Brother. 

I HAVE but little more to add ; my (to me) sad tale is nearly told ; 
but I will here insert some extracts from a journal of a dear Scotch 
friend, who spent a month in his house, which, though never meant 
to see the light, have most kindly been given to me at my request ; 
I feel them to be valuable, not only because they are nearly the 
last notes I have of him (being taken the year before his death), 
but because they also, on many points, confirm, from notes 
taken at the moment, the traits I have given of him from mere 
recollection. 

" ' Do you not like the country V ' I like London a great deal 
better ; the study of men and women, better than trees and 
grass/ 

" ' Oh ! some men are born happy. I often think what a 
fortunate circumstance it was for me, in going to Edinburgh (quite 
a stranger), to fall at once into intimacy with such remarkable men 
as Jeffrey and the rest.' ' How was it ?' 'I went to Edinburgh 
with a pupil, — I had nothing else. Then the Edinburgh Review, 
— what a machine that has been ! ' 

" ' I love Jeffrey very dearly ;' and, speaking of his knowledge of 
all subjects, and his view of Madame de Stael : ' I used to say then 
that the nearest thing Jeffrey had ever seen to a fine Parisian lady 
was John Playfair.' How we laughed at this ! 

" ' Miss Edgeworth was delightful, — so clever and sensible ! She 
does not say witty things, but there is such a perfume of wit runs 
through all her conversation as makes it very brilliant.' 

" We walked home after church ; he paid visits to the cottagers, 
speaking to them frankly and cheerily, or scolding them for not 
coming to tell him they were better, or that they wanted more 
medicine. 

"' Nobody' (says a sketch in the 'Spectator,' written by some 
friend) ' too obscure for Sydney to put in good-humour with them- 
selves.' Nay, I have seen him brighten the countenance of his 
poor parishioners for the day, by a captivating phrase or two, when 



252 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

he met them, or visited their cottages. On one occasion, his parish* 
clerk being laid up with a broken shin, Sydney called to inquire. 
• I 'm getting round, your honour, but I sha'n't be fit for duty on 
Sunday.' ' Sorry for that, Lovelace ; indeed, we shall miss you at 
the singing.' Then, turning to me, — ' You can't think what a good 
hand Lovelace is at a psalm ; you should hear him lead off the Old 
Hundred.' At which the old clerk's eyes fairly glistened, and he 
stammered out, ' Oh ! your honour's only saying that to cheer me 
up a bit.' 

" Sometimes he had a good report to give of an absent son or 
daughter, whom he had seen in London, and obtained a place for. 
He employed many old people about the garden, and was anxious 
that everybody near him should be comfortable. ' Have you seen 
my doctor's shop ? Come, I '11 show it you.' I expressed my won- 
der. ' Yes, life is a difficult thing ; here 's everything prepared, — 
stomach- warmers, sore-throat collars, &c. I studied medicine, and 
went through the hospitals at Edinburgh ; I know a good deal. I 
often regret that medical men will not talk more of their profession. 
It is a very interesting subject to every one, at least a little of it ; 
but I never can get any of them to speak, — they look quite 
offended.' 

" The poor people and the servants are very fond of him ; he 
does them so much good, and gives them clothes, books, medicines. 
They look to him for everything, and they like his free speaking to 
them ; he is so merry and frank : so my maid tells me. 

"He sometimes read aloud to Mrs Sydney and me in the even- 
ing, when anything struck him, — such as parts of Liebig, — so 
clearly and distinctly, observing shortly on parts as he read, and 
listening good-naturedly to our observations. We had each our 
arm-chair, lamp, and book in the evening, and not much conver- 
sation when alone. Occasionally he would sit with an air of pro- 
found meditation, and would begin as thus : — ' Forgive us our tres- 
passes, as we forgive them that trespass against us. That is new ; 
that is peculiar to the Christian religion.' Or he would repeat the 
sublime prayers for the Queen, in his grand tones, to mark their 
fine composition. 

" ' I dine sometimes at , and the head of the bank sits at the 

foot of the table, looking so attentive, and bowing so obsequiously ; 
and when I talk, a tort et a travers, as I am apt to do, I see by his 
expression that he says to himself, " There is a man I would not 
lend money to at fifteen per cent; he's a rash man ; he would buy 
bad Exchequer bills ; he is not to be trusted." He little knows 
me.' i That is very true,' said Mrs Sydney ; ' people are not aware 
that Sydney, with all his mirth, is one of the most cautious, pru- 
dent men that ever existed ; he is always looking forward, and pro* 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 253 

viding against what may happen.' ' Yes, I always expect the worst ; 
but it has a good effect, for it makes me cautious.' 

" ' When I went to Edinburgh I had two introductions, to Sir 

William Forbes and Professor . He was clerk to the General 

Assembly of the Kirk. He said to me one day after dinner, " D — n 
the solemn league and covenant ! it has spoiled the longs and 
shorts in Scotland."' 

" ' I like Dr Fergusson much. William Clerk is an original man ; 
how rare it is to meet an original man ! ' 

" ' I wish sometimes that I were a Scotchman, to have people care 
about me so much.' 

"'The Americans, I see, call me a Minor Canon. They are 
abusing me dreadfully to-day : they call me Xantippe ; they might 
at least have known my sex ; and they say I am eighty-four. I 
don't know how it is,' said he laughing, 'but everybody who 
behaves ill to me is sure to come to mischief before the year 's out. 
I am not angry with them ; I only say, I pity you, you are sure to 
suffer.' 

" ' Were you remarkable as a boy, Mr Smith ? ' ' Yes, Madam, 
I was a remarkably fat boy. I was at one time to have been a 
supercargo to China, to Hongkong.' 

" ' Here is a hymn-book that an old man of eighty-four sends me, 
he says, because of his pleasure in hearing of my giving the living 
of Edmonton to Tate's son. I should have been better pleased if 
it had not cost me a shilling.' ' Oh ! ' said Mrs Sydney, ' I would 
willingly have given a guinea for it.' 

" ' Here is an anonymous letter from some one who has a quantity 
of Mississippi bonds, asking me what he should do with them. 
How can I tell? they are not worth sixpence.' 

" That month every post brought letters to him, either of com- 
plaint of the Americans, of the income-tax, or of some evil, which 
the writers (strangers) entreated Mr Smith to write against, and to 
help them to remedy. There were also many feeling letters on the 
subject of his generosity to the family of Canon Tate. He could 
not conceive why the world praised him so much for that ; he 
always spoke so simply about it, that it showed me how natural it 
was to his disposition to be kind and generous. He was evidently 
pleased by some of the newspapers' clever notices of his Letters to 
America. ' Well, they lay it on pretty thick to-day ; where is Mrs 
Sydney?' He was perpetually coming to her with something for 
her sympathy or consultation ; and richly did she deserve that 
happiness, from her devoted love and admiration. One day I 
pointed out an article in the ' Times,' of one who was reckoned the 
Sydney Smith of Spain : it amused him. 

" ' I had once a mind to write a letter to young bishops ; bishops 



254 MEMOIR OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH, 

I have known apeak to their inferior clergy worse than they do to 
their footmen/ 'Why do you not, Mr Smith?' ' Oh, it would be 
a life of contention ; 1 am too old to bear a life of contention now/ 

" * There is a specimen of national honesty ! read that marked 
with red ink.' ' Do you mean a joke ? ' ( No, no.' ' Do give me a 
sign.' ' Well, I '11 sometimes give you a sign when there is no joke, 
and you '11 be sure to laugh. Frere used to tread on a man's toes 
to make him think he said something wrong. . . . When I was in 
Edinburgh, I said to a lady, speaking of the Dean of Faculty, that 
we thought our Deans in England had no faculties. She said, 
" Well, I call that a very good joke ! " ' 

" ' I hope somebody will tell me when I grow old and prosy ; 
though I am not likely to get very prosy, I 'm in general so short.' 
1 Yes, too short, Mr Smith.' 

" Christmas Day was one rich in recollections. The weather was 
fine. I looked out, and saw the maid Maria gravely and busily 
tying on oranges to the branches of the bay-trees that were planted 
in large green tubs round the lawn. The effect was gay and sunny, 
and pleased him mightily. The sermon that day was a glorious 
one ; — on Christmas, the contrast of the world before the blessed 
era, and the sudden effect after, — gratitude, immortal life, &c. I 
hope the sermon is preserved. I cannot give a good account of all 
that was interesting at that time, of the children's feast, the schools, 
the prizes, the charities, &c. ; but I remember my admiration of the 
variety of character which Mr Smith displayed that day. From 
the sublime duties of the morning, he became, with the large 
family-party assembled at dinner, the Sydney Smith of London 
society ; and in the evening he was delightful. ' I crave for music, 
Mrs Smith ; music ! music !' He sang, with his sweet rich voice, 
'A few gay soarings yet.' He imitated an orchestra preluding, 
talking French, telling stories, and laughing so infectiously. Next 
morning he was merrier than ever ; I found the party all at break- 
fast, waiting till I came, before he would allow a Scotch cake to be 
touched, which my maid had prepared (bad enough). He had 
often asked me to suggest some improvement to his house, some- 
thing new — (poor I could think of nothing new, but cakes made 
with soda and buttermilk !) ; it was this cake we were all to take 
the same chance of suffering from, by eating it together. ' Let us 
make a tontine for the survivor/ said he, laughing. It was wonder- 
ful how he played upon this cake, on me, and on Scottish luxuries ; 
he fancied that I feared to be too comfortable. ' Oh, that easy 
couch ! you 11 suffer for that a thousand years hence, depend upon 
it.' 

" ' Want of money is a great evil : I declare, every guinea Ihave 
gained I have been the happier. I was very poor till I was 



MEMOIR OF 77//f REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 255 

appointed to St Paul's ; that made me easy, and then my brother 
Courtenay's death made me rich/ An old friend congratulating 
him on his appointment to St Paul's : ' Why, I think it makes me 
most happy to feel I can now keep a carriage and horses for her, 
in her old age (pointing to Mrs Sydney), which I could not have 
done before/ 

" ' I once rode on a turtle five feeb long, supported by two people : 
piety trampling luxury underfoot ! Do you take it ?' 

" The first sermon I heard in Combe Florey church was certainly 
meant for my good : ' Cast your care upon God, for He careth for 
you/ It was so comforting and encouraging ! With what delight 
did I look and listen, in that church, to the grand form and power- 
ful countenance, noble and melodious voice ! In reading the 
Lessons and Psalms, he read so as almost to make a commentary 
on every word, and the meaning came out so rich and deep. His 
sermons were not given in St Paul's with more interest and effect ; 
and yet they were adapted to the congregation, from their plain and 
practical sense. Remembering him in St Paul's crowded cathedral, 
and looking at him in the little village church, filled with peasantry, 
I was pleased to see him always the same. 

" I wish I could convey the idea of his appearance as he sat in 
the bay-window of the library, writing. I used sometimes, in walk- 
ing past, to venture near, to look at him. There was power, pro- 
fundity, and meaning in his countenance ; and he would often take 
up his papers with an amused expression. I was convinced that 
he was a very happy man. I often regretted that I had no spirits 
or courage to speak to him, or to join him in his walks in the 
garden, but I have much respect for the silence of a great man. 

"These memorandums seem very simple, but I wished to be 
able to recall to myself the looks and tones of one whom I had 
been accustomed to admire through much of my life ; and I feel, 
when writing for myself, that my impressions are conveyed. 

" On New Year's Day, we were walking in the garden • he dis- 
covered a crocus, which had burst through the frozen earth ; he 
stopped suddenly, gazed at it silently for a few seconds, and, touch- 
ing it with his staff, pronounced slowly and solemnly, ' The resur- 
rection of the world ! ' * 

To this pretty, simple journal I have little to add. Yet how dif- 
ferent are the minds of men ! An apple fell to the ground, and 
Sir Isaac Newton saw in it one of the great laws of nature. How 
many men would have passed that little crocus, and seen in it only 
a flower : whilst to my father's mind (not quite unworthy of this 
great ancestor) it brought at one glance to his thoughts all the 
wonderful effects the breath of life, which had gone forth, was pro- 



256 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

during in every portion of the world, for man's benefit now, and 
was to produce on man himself in a world to come. 

He saw but one resurrection upon earth more. In the spring he 
went up to London, as usual, for a short time ; and whilst there, 
met, at the house of M. Van de Weyer, a literary man of some 
eminence who afterwards published a sketch of him in the " Revue 
des Deux Mondes," in which he introduced a short and humorous 
answer of my father's to him, not however intended for publication. 
My mother wishing to know some particulars of this from M. Van 
de Weyer, after my father's death, he had the kindness, amidst all 
the hurry of a sudden departure for Germany, to write out the fol- 
lowing account of the transaction for her, which he has given me 
permission to insert. 

"June, 1852. 
" My dear Mrs Sydney Smith, 

" I hasten, before our departure for Germany, to enclose, accord- 
ing to your wishes, several extracts from the letters which my poor 
friend Eugene Robin wrote to me on the subject of the article pub- 
lished by him in the ' Revue des Deux Mondes.' 

" In 1844, Eugene Robin, who had left Brussels, where he had 
been educated, and had, at a very early age, distinguished himself, 
both as a poet and a critic, spent a few days with us in London ; and, 
as he was anxious to know the best and most original writers of 
England, we had long conversations together on the works of Mr 
Sydney Smith, which I lent him, and for which he soon felt and 
expressed a great admiration. On the 22nd of April, I received 
from him the following letter : — 

" ' Vous vous souvenez peut-etre de m'avoir parle de la collection 
des e'erits de Jeffrey et de Sydney Smith sur lesquels il y avait de 
bons articles a faire pour la ' Revue des Deux Mondes.' Le 
* Jeffrey ' a e*te* traite* par M. Forcade, dans la derniere livraison ; 
mais le 'Sydney Smith' vient de m'echoir en partage. J'ai 
demande le livre a. Londres ; mais je voudrais bien, comrae vous 
connaissez intimement l'auteur, que vous eussiez la bont6, si vos 
loisirs vous le permettent, de me dire si ce sont Ik r^ellement tous 
ses ouvrages ; de me donner (e'est bien indiscret de vous demander 
ces choses-la) sur l'homme et sur l'ecrivian de ces details qu'avec 
votre esprit d'observation, vous seul pouvez bien connaitre. lis 
ajouteraient singulierement de prix a un travail fait avec conscience. 
J'ai le pain de mon article ; j'attends de vous le sel. Pourquoi 
m'avez-vous encourag6 a ne voir en vous que l'homme de lettres 
bienveillant pour ses jeunes confreres ? Je ne vous importunerais 
pas de la sorte.' 

" I immediately answered that I very much regretted not to be 
able to comply with his request, my very intimacy with Mr Sydney 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. > 57 

Smith preventing me, without his consent, from sending for a 
Review any biographical anecdotes or critical observations on his 
life and writings ; but advised M. Robin to write himself to Mr S. 
Smith, and I ofTered to deliver his letter, and to explain both his 
reasons for doing so, and my reasons for not acceding to his 
demand, and to obtain an answer for him. M. Robin sent me a 
charming letter (I regret that I have not kept a copy of it), for Mr 
Sydney Smith, who kindly approved of what I had said and done, 
and entrusted to my care an answer to Eugene Robin's letter.* 

" More than two months elapsed before Eugene Robin acknow- 
ledged the receipt of this letter to me in the following words : — 

11 Paris, lez Sept., 1844. 
" ' Vous avez bien voulu m'envoyer la lettre amicale et toujours 
spirituelle de votre ami le R^vdrend Sydney Smith. Elle m'a 
grandement encourage^ a faire Tarticle dont je vous avais parte ; 
maintenant, ce travail est fini depuis plus de quinze jours ; il n'y 
manque plus que quelques petits details biographiques, qui, transmis 
par vous, selon le desir exprime par M. Sydney Smith, releveraient 
singulierement mon recit et ma critique. Si vous vouliez faire un 
.effort en faveur de Taimable Chanoine de Saint-Paul, que ne vous 
devrais-je pas?' 

ft I have not kept a copy of my answer to him, the substance of 
which was communicated to Mr Sydney Smith. The article ap- 
peared soon after, and Mr Sydney Smith was informed of its pub- 
lication by M. Robin. This letter was not sent through me : I 
heard of it by the two following notes from Mr Sydney Smith : — 

iil October 21, 1844. 
" ' You may remember I wrote through you to Eugene Robin, 
giving, at his request, some account of myself. I have received a 
letter from him, stating that the Review is published, and that he 
has quoted a part of my letter. I confess this rather alarms me. 
Will it be putting you to an inconvenience if I beg the loan of the 
Review for two or three hours ? I will deviate from my usual 
custom, and return it punctually.' 

" ' October 24. 

" i I have received the Review by post, so I will not trouble you 
for yours. 

* ' Eugene has said more about me than I deserve. He is of 
himself a little long ; but I am very much pleased and flattered bv 

* The letter, having been already published, is pet grf «u hew- 



2$8 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

the approbation of so clever a man. He had better not have 
quoted my letter ; but there is no great harm. Yours, 

" ' Sydney Smith.' 

" We leave to-morrow. Believe me, my dear Mrs Sydney Smith, 
yours very faithfully, 

" Sylvain Van de Weyer." 

During the summer of this year, he received many of his old 
friends ; and, amongst others, his eldest and now only brother, 
Robert, Mr Hallam, and Mr Everett, the American minister. Of 
this visit I find this touching notice in a letter of Mr Everett's to 
my mother, on receiving the volume of posthumous sermons she 
published : — 

" One of them I heard him preach in his little village church at 
Combe Florey. The reading of it brings back to me, in the 
freshest recollection, that delightful visit, — one of the brightest 
spots in my English residence, — though I am painfully affected by 
considering that the two great men whose society I then enjoyed 
are gone ; men who, in their peculiar paths of eminence, have not 
left their equals behind them/' On another.occasion Mr Everett 
says : — " The first remark that I made to myself, after listening to 
Mr Sydney Smith's conversation, was, that if he had not been 
known as the wittiest man of his day, he would have been accounted 
one of the wisest." 

My father opened his house for a month to that poor, interesting 
family for whom he had interceded with so much success with Sir 
Robert Peel, and who were pining for a little fresh air. Amongst 
these was a clever, imaginative little boy, by whom he was much 
interested. Every evening he examined into his conduct during 
the day ; and, if blameless, sent him to bed with a large red wafer 
stuck in the middle of his forehead as a reward. The Order of the 
Garter could not have made the child more proud. Once only, 
during his visit, did he forfeit the red wafer, and went sobbing and 
broken-hearted to bed ; having been convicted, first, of cutting off 
the whiskers of Muff, Annie Kay's favourite cat ; and last, though 
not least, meddling with the poetical salad when dressed. Such 
crimes could not, of course, be pardoned ! 

My father went, for a short time, in the autumn, to the sea-side, 
complaining much of languor. He said, " I feel so weak, both in 
body and mind, that I verily believe, if the knife were put into my 
hand, I should not have strength or energy enough to stick it into 
a Dissenter." 

In Octobo-r ray father was taken seriously ill ; and Dr Holland 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 259 

went down immediately to Combe Florey, and advised his coming 
up to town, where he might be constantly under his care. He 
soon after followed this advice, and bore the journey well ; and, 
for the first two months, though very weak, went out in his carriage 
every day, saw his friends, broke out into moments of his natural 
gaiety, when he occasionally felt less suffering, saying one day, 
with his bright smile, to General Fox (when they were keeping him 
on very low diet, and not allowing him any meat), " Ah, Charles ! 
I wish I were allowed even the wing of a roasted butterfly ; ; ' and 
he was at times so like his former self, that, though Dr Holland 
was uneasy about him, we could not give up hope. 

But other and more urgent symptoms coming on, Dr Holland 
became so anxious, that he begged that Dr Chambers might be 
called in. My father most unwillingly consented, — not from any 
dislike of Dr Chambers, but from having the most perfect confi- 
dence in Dr Holland's care and skill. 

That evening he, for the first time, told his old maid and nurse, 
Annie Kay, that he knew his danger ; said where and how he 
should wish to be buried ; then spoke of us all, but told her we 
must cheer him, and keep up his spirits, if he lingered long. But 
he had such a dread of sorrowful faces around him, and of inflict- 
ing pain, that to us he always spoke calmly and cheerfully, and as 
if unaware of his danger. 

He now never left his bed. Though suffering much, he was 
gentle, calm, and patient ; and sometimes even cheerful. He spoke 
but little. Once he said to me, taking my hand, " I should like to 
get well, if it were only to please Dr Holland ; it would, I know, 
make him so happy ; this illness has endeared him so much to me." 

Speaking once of the extraordinary interest that had been 
evinced by his friends for his recovery (for the inquiries at his door 
were incessant), — " It gives me pleasure, I own," he said, " as it 
shows I have not misused the powers entrusted to me." But he 
was most touched by the following letter from Lady Grey to my 
mother, expressing the feelings towards him of one of the friends 
he most loved and honoured, — one who was, like himself, lying on 
that bed from which he was never to rise, and who was speaking 
as it were his farewell before entering on eternity. 

" Lord Grey is intensely anxious about him. There is nobody 
of whom he so constantly thinks ; nobody whom, in the course of 
his own long illness, he so ardently wished to see. Need I add, 
dear Mrs Sydney, that, excepting only our children, there is nobody 
for whom we both feel so sincere an affection. God knows how 
truly I feel for your anxiety. Who is so sadly entitled to do so as 
I am ? But I will hope the best, and that we may both be blessed 
by seeing the person most dear to us restored to health." 



260 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

One evening, when the room was half-darkened, and he had 
been resting long in silence, and I thought him asleep, he suddenly 
burst forth, in a voice so strong and full that it startled us, — 

" We talk of human life as a journey, but how variously is that 
journey performed ! There are some who come forth girt, and 
shod, and mantled, to walk on velvet lawns and smooth terraces, 
where every gale is arrested, and every beam is tempered. There 
are others who walk on the Alpine paths of life, against driving 
misery, and through stormy sorrows, over sharp afflictions ; walk 
with bare feet, and naked breast, jaded, mangled, and chilled." 

And then he sank into perfect silence again. In quoting this 
beautiful passage from his sermon on riches, his mind seems to 
have turned to the long and hard struggles of his own early life. 

The present painful struggle did not last many days longer. He 
often lay silent and lost in thought, then spoke a few words of 
kindness to those around. He seemed to meet death with that 
calmness which the memory of a well-spent life, and trust in the 
mercy of God, can alone give. 

Almost the last person he saw was his favourite and now only- 
surviving brother, Bobus ; and nothing could be more affecting 
than to see these two brothers thus parting on the brink of the 
grave ; for my dear uncle only left my father's deathbed to lie 
down in his own, — literally fulfilling the petition my father so 
touchingly made to him in one of his early letters, on hearing of 
his illness, " to take care of himself, and wait for him," — and before 
the end of a fortnight had followed him to the grave. 

" Heslington, 1813. 
" Dear Bobus, 
" Pray take care of yourself. We shall both be a brown infrag- 
rant powder in thirty or forty years. Let us contrive to last out 
for the same, or nearly the same time. Weary will the latter half 
of my pilgrimage be, if you leave me in the lurch. 

" Ever your affectionate brother, 

" Sydney Smith." 

Of the genius, learning, and virtue that were lost to the world 
in that grave, I dare not attempt to speak ; it belongs to other 
and abler pens than mine to tell ; but to me my uncle's death was 
as the death of a second father, — the extinction of all I have ever 
known or conceived that was brightest and best in the world. 

A very eminent man, who had the rare privilege of associating 
intimately with my uncle, writes of him to Sir Henry Holland : — 
" I never knew a mind with so gigantic a grasp. Our talk when 
alone was alwavs most serious." 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 261 

These beautiful and characteristic lines were found in my uncle's 
desk, supposed to have been composed by him shortly before 
his death : — 

" ' Hie jacet!'— O humanarum meta ultima rerum! 
Ultra quam labor et luctus curseque quiescunt, 
Ultra quam penduntur opes et gloria flocci ; 
Et redit ad nihilum vanaTisec et turbida vita : 
Ut te respicerent homines ! Quae befla per orbem, 
Qui motus animorum et quanta pericula nostra 
Acciperent facilem sine csede et sanguine fincm ! 
Tu mihi versare ante oculos, non tristis imago, 
Sed monitrix, ut me ipse regam, domus ha;c mihi cum sit 
Vestibulum tumuli, et senii penultima sedes." 

" ' Hie jacet ! ' — O last goal of human things, beyond which 
labour and mourning and cares are at rest, — beyond which riches 
and glory are weighed as nothing, and this vain and turbid life 
returns to nought ! Oh that men would thus regard thee ! What 
wars throughout the world, what passions of the soul, how many 
dangers besetting us, might so obtain an easy termination without 
slaughter or blood ! Mayest thou be present before my eyes, not 
a mournful image, but an admonisher, that I should regulate 
myself ; since this house is to me the vestibule of the tomb, and 
the next to closing seat of my old age !" 



My father died at peace with himself and with all the world ; anxious, 
to the last, to promote the comfort and happiness of others. Acting 
on the beautiful precept of our Saviour, a precept he had often 
remarked as peculiar to Christianity alone, he sent messages of 
kindness and forgiveness to the few he thought had injured him 
in life. Almost his last act was bestowing a small living of ^120 
per annum on a poor, worthy, and friendless clergyman, who had 
lived a long life of struggle with poverty on £^0 per annum.* Full 
of happiness and gratitude, he entreated he might be allowed to 
see my father ; but the latter so dreaded any agitation that he most 
unwillingly consented, saying, " Then he must not thank me ; I 
am too weak to bear it." He entered, — my father gave him a few 
words of advice, — the clergyman silently pressed his hand, and 
blessed his deathbed. Surely such blessings are not given in 
vain ! 

My father expired on the 22d of February 1845, — his death caused 
by hydrothorax, or water on the chest, consequent upon disease 
of the heart, which had probably existed for a considerable time, 

* In dictating a few words in his favour (for he was too weak to write) to the Bishop 
of Llandaff, be says : — " In addition to his other merits, I am sure he will have one iu 
your eyes, for he is an out-and-out Tory." So little did party-feelings influence my 
father in bestowing preferment 1 



261 MEMOIR W THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

but rapidly increased during the few months preceding his death. 
His son closed his eyes. He was buried, by his own desire, as 
privately as possible, in the cemetery of Kensal Green ; where his 
eldest son, Douglas, and now my mother, repose by his side. 

And it true greatness consists, as my dear and valued old friend 
Mr Rogers once quoted here from an ancient Greek writer, " in 
doing what deserves to be written, and writing what deserves to be 
read, and in making mankind happier and better for your life," 
my father was a truly great and good man. 

Here I shall insert two most touching letters from his friend 
Lord Jeffrey, — the one on the occasion of his long, last illness, and 
the other on receiving the fragment on the Irish Church, after my 
father's death. I give them with the more pleasure, as they not 
only furnish fresh proof of the tenderness and kindness of Lord 
Jeffrey's nature, but afford ample testimony to the devotion and 
admiration he bore my father, and which my father's deep love for 
him so fully deserved. To my regret, this has been almost passed 
over, or barely alluded to, in the Life lately published of Lord 
Jeffrey. 

"Edinburgh, Feb. loth, 1845. 
a My dear Saba, 

" I do not know when I have felt more moved and delighted, 
than when Professor Pillans came into my room yesterday with a 
short letter from our beloved Sydney (but in his wife's handwriting), 
cheerfully written ; and saying, among other things, and in sub- 
stance, that he ' looked forward to his recovery, and at all events 
was making very valuable progress : ' I think those were the words. 
I need not tell you how sad we have all been about him, nor what 
a gloom the accounts we have lately received have thrown over the 
circle of his ancient friends. While that lasted, I for one at least 
had not courage to distress you by any inquiry ; but this letter has 
excited a less painful anxiety, and I hope you will forgive me for 
the trouble it leads me to give you. You cannot over-estimate the 
interest I take in the oldest and truest of my remaining friends ; 
and I believe I may say the same of Murray. Do then, my dear 
child, let us know whether we may not hope again. 

" And believe me always affectionately yours, 

" F. Jeffrey." 

" Haileybury College, Hertford, April 21, 1845. 
" My very dear Saba, 
" I have felt several times in the last six weeks that I ought to 
have written to some of you ; but in truth, my dear child, I had 
not the courage ; and to-day it is not so much because I have the 
courage, as because I cannot help it. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 263 

" That startling and matchless Fragment was laid upon my table 
this morning ; and before I had read out the first sentence, the 
real presence of my beloved and incomparable friend was so 
brought before me, in all his brilliancy, benevolence, and flashing 
decision, that I seemed again to hear his voice and read in his eye, 
and burst into an agony of crying. I went through the whole in 
the same state of feeling : my fancy kindled, and my intellect 
illumined, but my heart struck through with the sense of our loss, 
so suddenly and so deeply impressed by this seeming restoration. 

" I do not think he ever wrote anything so good, and I feel 
mournfully that there is no one man alive who could have so 
written. The effect, I am persuaded, will be greater than from any 
of his other publications : it is a voice from the grave. And it may 
truly be said that those who will not listen to it, would not be per- 
suaded though one were to rise from the dead. 

" It relieves me to say all this, and you must forgive it. 
Heaven bless you, my dear child ! With kind remembrances from 
all here, 

" Ever very affectionately yours, 

" F. Jeffrey." 



My mother's anxiety to have a Memoir written of my father had 
induced her to apply very soon after his death to Mr Moore, for 
his able assistance ; but upon further consideration it was thought 
the event was then too recent ; and before sufficient materials 
could be collected for the purpose, Mr Moore's health rendered 
the task impossible. The following letter refers to my mother's 
request to Lord Jeffrey to contribute his recollections of my 
father. 

" June 14, 1845. 
" My dear Mrs Smith, 

" I do not systematically destroy my letters, but I take no care 
of them, and very few, I fear, have been preserved. I shall make 
a search, however, and send you all I can. I was very glad to hear, 
some time ago, that Moore had agreed to assist in preparing the 
memorial, about which you are naturally so much interested. He 
will do it, I am sure, in a right spirit, and with the feeling which 
we are all anxious to see brought to its execution. Then he writes 
gracefully, is so great a favourite with the public, that the addition 
of his name cannot fail to be a great recommendation. If it occurs 
to me, on reflection, that there is anything I can contribute in the 
way you suggest, I shall be most happy to have my name once 
more associated with his on such an occasion. You know it must 
always be a pleasure to me to comply with any request of yours ; 



264 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

and the form in which you wish this to be done, is certainly that 
which I should prefer to any other. Yet the models to which you 
refer, might well deter me from attempting anything that might lead 
to comparison.* 

u I am glad to think of you at Munden,f rather than in Green 
Street, in this charming weather ; and beg to be most kindly re- 
membered there to my beloved Emily and all her belongings. 

" I have not had much to boast of in the way of health since my 
return, but have still been well enough hitherto to get through with 
my work. We are fixed here now, I think, pretty much till winter, 
and expect to be joined by Charley, and her infant, in a fortnight. 
" With kindest regards, 

" Ever very affectionately yours, 

" Craigcrook? " F. Jeffrey." 



"Derby* 

" My dear Mrs Sydney, 

" Your kind note of the 12th came to me at the Euston Hotel 
this morning, when I was in the act of sallying forth to join the 
train which brought me here two hours ago. So you see I could 
not possibly thank you any earlier for your kind inquiries, nor 
gratify myself by the interesting pilgrimage to Green Street, which 
I should otherwise have undertaken with such a deep devotion of 
feeling. I hope yet to live, however, to commune with my heart at 
that shrine. X I am g^d that Eddis has been so successful. For 
calm and true expression, and the rendering of what is moral, rather 
than passionate, in our natures, I think he is the first of our living 
artists. I have indeed been very ill and recover but slowly, though 
I have little actual suffering, and hope to be a little less feeble and 
shabby yet before I die. Notwithstanding, I have no anxiety, nor 
low spirits, though the animal vitality is at times low enough, God 
knows. My affections and the enjoyment of beautiful nature, I 
thank Heaven, are as fresh and lively as in the first poetical days 
of my youth, and with these there is nothing very miserable in the 
infirmity of age. We are taking two of our grandchildren down 
with us, and I hope to have the whole household reunited at Craig- 
crook, on the first days of July. They are all (except the poor 
patriarch who tells you so) in the full flush of health and gaiety, 
and would make a brightness in a darker home than mine. 

" Give my true and tender love to my dear Emily. I often 
think of her in her early home at Foston, and in that still earlier 

* Sydney's Letters to the Editors of Sir J. Mackintosh and Mr Horner's Memoirs. 

t Mr Hibbert's house in Hertfordshire. 

X A portrait of my father, which Mr Eddis bad just painted for my mother. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 265 

Yorkshire home, where she tempted me to expose myself on the 
jackass.* 

"With kind remembrances to Hibbert and all his descendants, 
God bless you all, and always. 

" Very affectionately yours, 

" F. Jeffrey," 



Hi/its on Female Education. 
Though the subject of education is now much more generally 
studied and understood than it was formerly, yet the following slight 
hints, written at the request of a very young mother, when my father 
was a very young man, may not be entirely without value and in- 
terest to some young mother now ; and at least show how early he 
felt the value and importance of education to women. I received 
them too late to insert them in their proper place. 

" I am afraid, my dear Madam, you will find in these few hints 
little which you have not already anticipated, and that their only 
merit will be, that intention of being useful to your children by 
which they are dictated. Your daughters will have a great deal 
to do, and you will have a great deal to superintend ; and exertion 
on their part, and inspection on yours, will lose very much of their 
effects without a systematic distribution of time. I cannot compli- 
ment you with having been a great economist of life. In your own 
instance indeed it is not of much importance ; but the education of 
your daughters ought to (and I am sure will) impose upon you a 
restraint of natural propensities. If you wish to be useful to them, 
you must be active, persevering, and systematic ; you must lay 
out the day in regular plots and parterres ; and toil and relax at 
intervals, fixed as much as your other affairs will permit. The con- 
sideration of religion may perhaps be brought too frequently before 
the minds of young people. Pleasure and consolation through life 
may be derived from a judicious religious education ; a mistaken 
zeal may embitter the future days of a child with superstition, 
melancholy, and terror. Short prayers at rising and going to bed ; 
a regular attendance at church ; the precepts of a mother as a 
friend, sparingly and opportunely applied, appear to me to be the 
best kind of foundation for the superstructure of religion. It will 
be wise perhaps to teach them very early tha'. Sunday is a day on 
which their ordinary studies should be laid aside, and others of a 
more serious nature attended to. What the religious books are which 
are to be put into the hands of children, you know best ; but there 

* See Narrative, p. in. 



266 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

are some which, when their understandings become more enlarged, 
your daughters should certainly read, such as . . .* 

" God has made us with strong passions and little wisdom. To 
inspire the notion that infallible vengeance will be the consequence 
of every little deviation from our duty is to encourage melancholy 
and despair. Women have often ill-health and irritable nerves ; 
they want moreover that strong coercion over the fancy which judg- 
ment exercises in the minds of men ; hence they are apt to cloud their 
minds with secret fears and superstitious presentiments. Check, 
my dear Madam, as you value their future comfort, every appear- 
ance of this in your daughters ; dispel that prophetic gloom which 
dives into futurity, to extract sorrow from days and years to come, 
and which considers its own unhappy visions as the decrees of 
Providence. We know nothing of to-morrow ; our business is to 
be good and happy to-day. 

" One of the great practical goods which Christianity is every day 
producing to society is that extreme attention to the necessities of 
the poor, for which this country is so remarkable. I hope you will 
give your daughters a taste for active interference of this kind ; 
nothing makes a woman so amiable and respectable. 

" I would keep from my daughters immoral books, sceptical books, 
and novels ; from which last I except Sir C. Grandison. I confess 
I have a very great dread of novels ; the general moral may be 
good, but they dwell on subjects and scenes which it appears to me 
it is the great object of female education to exclude. A woman's 
heart does not want softening ; it is a strange composition of tears, 
sighs, sorrows, ecstasies, fears, smiles, &c. &c. ; — a man is all flesh 
and blood. 

" I hope at the proper time you will take your children into the 
world. It will please them, relieve them from that painful shyness 
and embarrassment inseparable from a retired life, and give them 
the fair chance they ought to have of settling to advantage. 

" The accomplishments are of use, as they embellish and occupy 
the mind ; but after all, they are subordinate points of education, 
and too much time may very easily be given to them. It is very 
agreeable to look at good drawings ; it is very delightful to hear 
good music ; but good sense, sound judgment, and cultivated 
understanding, are superior to everything else; — they make the 
good wife, the enlightened mother, the interesting companion. Do 
not suppose I am decrying accomplishments. I am only giving 
them their just rank, and guarding against that exclusive care and 
absorbent eagerness with which it is at present the fashion to culti- 
vate them. 

* Omitted, because, since this period, works fitted for the young have become so 
numerous and are so improved, that the list is of little use. 



MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 267 

" You mean to give your girls a taste for reading. Nothing else 
can so well enable them to pass their lives with dignity, with 
innocence, and with interest. Let us go into detail, and see if we 
can chalk out a convenient plan for them. They must learn French ; 
do you know enough of this language to instruct them, or must 
they have a master ? If the latter, the grammar, pronunciation 
&c, will be his affair. In the choice of books it will be very much 
in your power to direct them ; the first will be easy, and suitable to 
children in point of language ; such books abound, — you cannot 
mistake them ; then the whole field of French literature is open 
for you to select from. For example, when you think them old 
enough, and sufficiently acquainted with the language, let them 
read Bourdaloue and Massillon's Sermons, Bossuet's Oraisons 
Funebres, Sermons of Father Elise'e, as specimens of the sacred 
eloquence of the French ; let them read some of the best plays of 
Pierre Corneille, Racine, Moliere, Voltaire's tragedies, some ot 
Boileau, particularly the Lutrin, the Henraide of Voltaire. Sup- 
posing they wish to read French history, always take care to make 
geography and chronology go hand in hand with history, without 
which it is nothing but a confused jumble of places and events. 
When they have read the history of Greece and Rome, they should 
not fail to read Plutarch's Lives ; one of the most delightful books 
antiquity has left us. They will of course pay an early attention 
to the history of their own country, which they w:ll find curiously 
detailed in Henry, philosophically in Hume, drily and accurately in 
Rapin. With the poets and dramatic writers of our own country 
you are as well acquainted as myself. I hope they will learn 
Italian. In arithmetic it does not appear to be of consequence that 
they should go far, not further perhaps than compound division ; 
but I would certainly endeavour, by much practice, to make them 
very dexterous in the commoz? operations of subtracting, multiply- 
ing, and adding. It is of great importance to give them correct 
notions in the common elements of geography and astronomy, and 
to make them quite at their ease in the use of maps ; — this will be 
done in very little time. In the order of study, the acquirement of 
what is preparatory to general literature will first require your 
attention, as well as those which are of indispensable necessity ; I 
mean writing, ciphering, French, geography, spelling, &c. When 
these first difficulties are got over, put them boldly on the Greek 
and Roman history in the mornings, and poetry or belles letires — 
English or French — in the afternoons. Remark to them, encourage 
them to make their remarks to you ; applaud, blame, encourage, 
and use every little pious artifice in your power to give them that 
sure, best, and happiest of all worldly attainments — a taste for 
literary improvement. 



263 MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" I have recommended a division of studies into those of the 
morning and evening, because I think it can be very easily done 
without producing confusion, and it is tedious to dwell upon one 
subject for a whole day. If you can get them to read in a connected 
method, you will have gained a point of great importance. For 
example, Spenser precedes Dryden, Pope, &c. ; and by following 
this order of precedence, you see the improvement of language, and 
remark how each poet is indebted to those who went before him. 
Voyages and travels, and the history of modern Europe, would 
exhaust the longest life. Botany they will be delighted with. 

" I have given a list of some few books in the principal depart- 
ments of knowledge, in case they should strike into any one of 
them. The truth is, it is not important what part of knowledge 
they love best. A woman who loves history, is not more respect- 
able than a woman who loves natural philosophy ; either will afford 
innocent, dignified, improving occupation. If they show no predi- 
lection, then give them one : if they do, follow it. We move most 
quickly to that point where we wish to go. 

" Let your children see that you are sorry to restrain them, happy 
to indulge them. Confess your ignorance when they put questions 
to you which you cannot answer, and refer them elsewhere ; and 
relax from your instruction and authority in proportion as your 
children want them less. I write positively, my dear Madam, to 
avoid the long and circuitous language of diffidence, not because I 
attach any value to my opinions. 

" I have contented myself with general hints, because in writing 
on these subjects it is no very difficult thing to slip into a folio 
volume. I have omitted the mention of many things which I know 
you will do well, and have purposely introduced that of others 
where I have some apprehensions of you. If it were not to make 
you an offer unworthy of acceptance, I should say that my serious 
and most zealous advice is always at your command. 

" Adieu, my dear Madam ; take courage, exert yourself. If there 
be one sight on earth which commands interest, respect, and assist- 
ance from men, it is that of a good mother, who, under the provi- 
dence of God, exerts her whole strength for the advantage and 
improvement of her children. 

" Your most sincere well-wisher. 

" Sydney Smith." 



©pt'tapj. 



TO 

SYDNEY SMITH, 

ONE OF THE BEST OF MEN. 
HIS TALENTS, THOUGH ADMITTED BY HIS CONTEMPORARIES TO BE GREAT, 

WERE SURPASSED BY 

HIS UNOSTENTATIOUS BENEVOLENCE, HIS FEARLESS LOVE OF TRUTH, 

AND HIS ENDEAVOUR TO PROMOTE THE HAPPINESS OF MANKIND 

BY RELIGIOUS TOLERATION 

AND 

BY RATIONAL FREEDOM. 

HE WAS BORN THE 3RD OF JUNE, 1 771 J 

HE BECAME CANON RESIDENTIARY OF ST PAUL'S CATHEDRAL, 1 83 1 ; 

HE DIED FEBRUARY THE 22ND, 1 845. 



[On the opposite side of the Tomb.] 
DOUGLAS SMITH 

THE ELDEST SON OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

AND OF 

CATHARINE AMELIA, HIS WIFE. 

HE WAS BORN FEBRUARY 27, 1805 ; HE DIED APRIL 15, l820. 

HIS LIBE WAS BLAMELESS. 

HIS DEATH WAS THE FIRST SORROW 

HE EVER OCCASIONED HIS PARENTS, 

BUT IT WAS DEEP AND LASTING. 



LETTERS 



THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH 



MRS AUSTIN. 



EDITOR'S PREFACE 



It is, I think, necessary to offer some explanation of the part I 
have taken in the selection and arrangement of the following 
Letters for the press. 

It was in compliance with the earnest desire and repeated 
solicitations of Mrs Sydney Smith, that I undertook to edit the 
letters of her lamented husband, and to write a short Memoir, the 
materials for which she was to furnish. Flattered as I could not 
but be by her request, I was too sensible of my own incompetence 
to such a work to engage in it willingly ; and it was not till I found 
that no more competent editor (or none whom she esteemed so) was 
willing and able to undertake the task, that I yielded to the affect- 
ing importunities of my revered friend. 

Not long after I received the materials for the projected work, a 
dangerous illness left me in so shattered a state of health, that every 
exertion of mind or body was forbidden, and indeed impossible, to 
me ; and I begged Mrs Smith to receive back the papers she had 
entrusted to my care. Still she urged me to wait. While I waited, 
she arrived before me at the goal which I had so nearly reached. 
Immediately after her death I sent the papers to Lady Holland, to 
whom they had been bequeathed by her mother, telling her, that as 
I had no hope of such a return to health as would enable me to 
bear the anxiety I should feel in writing a Memoir of her honoured 
father, I must definitely decline so grave a responsibility. I added, 
that if my services in the business of selecting and arranging the 
letters for the press were of any value, she might command them. 
I ventured to believe that my veneration for Mr Smith's character, 
my earnest desire to set forth those high and solid qualities which 
the brilliancy of his wit had partly concealed from the dazzled eyes 
of the public, and my religious care not to make him do after his 
death that which he never did in life — inflict causeless or en- 
venomed wounds, — which might perhaps atone for deficiencies of 
v/hich I was as sensible as any of his admirers could be. 

I entirely concur with Lady Holland in the opinion, that the con- 

S 



274 PREFACE. 

ditions which alone can justify the publication of private letters are, 
" that they shall neither hurt the living, injure the dead, nor impair 
the reputation of the writer." Almost every contributor to this 
selection will therefore find that I have largely used my power (or 
rather fulfilled my duty) as Editor, and have omitted whatever I 
thought at variance with any one of these conditions. It is hardly 
necessary to say that not a word has been added. 

Not only is the tacit compact which used to protect the inter- 
courses of society now continually violated by the unauthorised 
publication of conversations and letters, but there are not wanting 
pretended champions of truth, who assert the claims of the public 
to be put in possession of all the transient impressions, the secret 
thoughts, the personal concerns, which an eminent man may have 
imparted to his intimate friends. Such claims are too preposter- 
ous to be discussed. They deserve only to be met by a peremptory 
rejection. Without the most absolute power of suppressing what- 
ever I thought it inexpedient to publish, I could not have meddled 
with anything so sacred as private letters. I am persuaded that no 
person of honour or delicacy will regret the amusement which 
might perhaps have been purchased by treachery to the dead, or 
indifference to the feelings of the living. 

In insisting, however, on the canons which ought to govern all 
editors of letters, let me, by no means, be understood to apply them 
specially to the letters of Sydney Smith. Few editors to whom so 
large a mass of private papers have been submitted, can say, as I 
can, with the strictest truth, that I have found nothing for which 
those who loved and honoured the writer need to blush. My 
opinion of Sydney Smith's great and noble qualities — his courage 
and magnanimity, his large humanity, his scorn of all meanness 
and all imposture, his rigid obedience to duty — was very high 
before. It is much higher now, that his inward life has been laid 
bare before me. He lived, as he says, in a house of glass. He was 
brave and frank in every utterance of his thoughts and feelings ; 
yet, though I have found opinions to which I could not assent, and 
tastes which are entirely opposed to my own, I have not found a 
sentiment unworthy a man of sense, honour, and humanity. I 
have found no trace of a mean, an unkind, or an equivocal action. 

So many sketches of Mr Sydney Smith's character have been 
written, and its more intimate parts are so vividly portrayed in his 
daughter's Memoir, that it would be worse than superfluous for me 
to attempt to add to them. I cannot however close a work which 
has long and anxiously engaged my attention, without adverting to 
a few of the points which have struck me during its progress. 

If the interest of a life were proportioned to the traces it leaves 
behind, few would afford richer materials to the biographer than 



PREFACE. 27S 

that of Sydney Smith. But the field on which the champions of 
truth have to do battle is often obscure, the conflict doubtful, the 
victory unperceived till long alter the combatants have ceased to 
exist. The story of their lives is marked by none of the striking 
incidents which mark the career of men of action. 

To understand the full significance of such a life as Sydney 
Smith's, we must ask ourselves what he accomplished. That he 
was the acknowledged projector of the Edinburgh Review, one of 
the early guardians of its principles (as appears from some of his 
letters to Jeffrey), and one of its most distinguished and powerful 
contributors, would of itself afford a satisfactory answer to this 
question. It is clear that he himself, though no man was less 
inclined to overrate the value of his own productions, looked back 
with a juSt satisfaction on the influence of that journal on public 
opinion. In a letter to Lord Jeffrey, dated Foston, 1825, he says, 
" It must be to you, as I am sure it is to me, a great pleasure to 
see so many improvements taking place, and so many abuses de- 
stroyed ; — abuses upon which you, with cannon and mortars, and 
I, with sparrow shot, have been playing for so many years." And 
again, in a letter to Mrs Crowe (January 6, 1 840) : " I printed my 
reviews to show that I had not passed my life merely in making 
jokes, but had made use of what little powers of pleasantry I might 
be endowed with, to discountenance bad, and to encourage liberal 
and wise principles." 

This was his own view of his vocation. In order to estimate his 
success in it, to trace the operation of his mind on the public mind 
(and hence on the public affairs) of England, we ought to present 
a complete and accurate view of its state at the beginning of his 
career. Such a retrospect is out of the question here. But we 
may confidently affirm that every day more clearly shows the depth 
of stolid prejudices, stupid and malignant antipathies, and time- 
honoured abuses, out of which we have emerged. 

Many of the giants Sydney Smith combated are not only slain, 
but almost forgotten ; and thus the very completeness of his success 
tends to efface from the minds of the present generation the extent 
of their obligations to him. But it ought never to be forgotten that, 
at the time he buckled on his armour, all these had nearly undis- 
puted possession of the field. To combat them was then a service 
of real danger. The men who now float on the easy and rapid 
current of reform are apt, in the intoxication of their own facile 
triumphs, to forget the difficulties and the perils which their pre- 
decessors had to encounter. Those who now represent the mest 
conservative opinions would then have passed for rash and dan- 
gerous innovators ; reforms long since accomplished would then 
have been regarded as visionary or dangerous. The French Re- 



276 PREFACE. 

volution— the fruitful parent of evils, of which na eye can yet 
discern the termination — had then utterly disordered the minds of 
men ; agitated by the wildest expectations of good, or terrors of 
evil, to result from that explosion of undisciplined popular will. It 
was in the midst of this universal frenzy and panic, that Sydney 
Smith's clear and sound understanding, neither dazzled by visions 
of impracticable good, nor alarmed by shadows of imaginary evil, 
seized upon those principles of which he was through life the daunt- 
less and inflexible advocate. 

Much has been said of the extraordinary faculties which he 
brought to this undertaking; yet the power which he exercised 
over the public mind, when his own powers were roused, has 
hardly been sufficiently insisted on. What other private gentleman 
of our day, unconnected with Parliament, without office, rank, or 
fortune, has been able, by a few pages from his pen, to electrify the 
country as he did by the publication of " Peter Plymley's Letters" ? 
Or to excite the feelings of two nations, as he did, by his letters to 
the Americans ? Or to fight, single-handed, against the combined 
power of the Ministry and of the dignitaries of the Church, a battle 
in which he carried public opinion along with him ? If such were 
the effects produced by one in so obscure a situation, what might 
he not have effected if placed in a position to exercise a more 
direct influence on the councils and affairs of the country ? 

He was a giant when roused, and the goad which roused him 
was Injustice. He was clear from envy, hatred, and all un- 
charitableness, and incapable of any littleness. He was ever 
ready to defend the weak. He showed as much zeal in saving a 
poor village boy, as in aiding a Minister of State. His hatred of 
every form of cant and affectation was only equalled by his prompt 
and unerring detection of it. Without admitting that the vice of 
hypocrisy is peculiarly English, we must confess that some of the 
forms which simulated virtue assumes in this country are not 
only, in common with all simulations, offensive to the love of truth, 
but are peculiarly repulsive to good sense and good taste. And 
there never was a man in whom they were calculated to excite 
more disgust than the brave, frank, and high-spirited gentleman 
whose letters are before us. For in him a passion for truth was 
enlightened by the utmost perspicacity of mind, and the most 
acute sense of the ludicrous and unseemly. 

It must also be constantly borne in mine that Mr Sydney Smith 
did not regard Christianity as an ascetic religion, but as a religion 
of peace, and joy, and comfort. We say this, not in justification of 
the view, which ft would be wholly out of place to discuss here, 
but of the consistency of him who held it. It was in perfect 
conformity with this belief, that he encouraged every social pleasure 



PREFACE. 



277 



and every taste for innocent enjoyment. These things he regarded 
not as lamentable concessions to the demands of a sinful nature, 
but as praiseworthy endeavours to mitigate the evils and sufferings 
of humanity, and hence in perfect harmony with the character and 
designs of a benevolent Creator. 

It is needless to insist on the generous audacity with which he 
formed and held his opinions, or the gallantry with which he threw 
himself into the breach to assert an unpopular truth, which others 
were " too timid to express for themselves." * All this is familiar. 
But we see also that the boldness and vigour with which he 
proclaimed his opinions were wholly without the tenacity or 
irritability of self-love : " You know that a short argument often 
convinces me/' he says to Lord Grey. And, again, where he 
mentions Sir Robert Peel's projected repeal of the Corn Laws, how 
candidly he avows his present disapprobation of that measure ! — 
how open is his mind to arguments in its favour ! There is some- 
thing as magnanimous as it is rare in this union of fearless candour 
with openness to conviction. 

When we consider the tremendous weapons with which he came 
armed into the world, — what powers he possessed of inflicting pain, 
and of adorning falsehood or immorality with the dazzling gems 
of his wit, we cannot withhold from him a feeling of gratitude for 
the generous and indulgent temper which led him to spare the 
weak, and for the high principle and taste which kept the precious 
talent entrusted to him pure, bright, and untainted. Never was 
wit so little addressed to the malignant, base, or impure passions of 
mankind. To this his Letters, poured forth out of the abundance 
of his fearless heart and high spirits, bear ample evidence. 

Lastly, I have been much struck with the perfect arrangement 
and symmetry of his life. He is never the sport of circumstances] 
but throughout the battle of life we find him determined to do his 
duty in whatever circumstances it shall please God to place him. 
This determination he carried into the most trifling details of do- 
mestic life. Whatever he did, he did it with all his might. Nothing 
was neglected, slurred over, or left to chance. The order in which 
he kept his accounts might serve as a model to any man of 
business ; and we have seen with what energy he introduced the 
same order into the affairs of the Chapter of which he was a 
member. 

This is no place for a dissertation on his literary merits. Yet I 
can hardly omit to remark how entirely they bore the stamp of his 
character. Never was the saying, " le style e'est rhomme," more 
applicable. Prompt, fearless, natural and easy, going straightfor- 
ward to the object, there is no laborious research or timorous hesita- 

. * See letter to Mr Bedford, of Bristol, January 13, 1829, 



278 PREFACE. 

lion as to tfoe words in which falsehood shall be exposed, or truth 
uttered. He was little indebted to books. His vigorous mind 
and fertile imagination supplied him with all he wanted ; and 
the manliness of his character gave force and freedom to all he 
wrote. 

The following remarks on Mr Sydney Smith's style, by Sir Henry 
Holland, which were given to me by Mrs Sydney Smith, are so just 
and discriminating, that I have begged permission to print them. 
They were called forth by these words, which I had quoted from 
the letter of a friend: — "If Mr Sydney Smith had not been the 
greatest and most brilliant of wits, he would have been the most 
remarkable man of his time for a sound and vigorous understanding 
and great reasoning powers ; and if he had not been distinguished 
for these, he would have been the most eminent and the purest writer 
of English." 

" Mrs Austin's friend," says Sir Henry Holland, " has admirably 
denoted the three eminent peculiarities of Mr Sydney Smith's 
writings — his vigorous sense, his wit, and the pure and masculine 
English of his style. The latter quality has scarcely been 
sufficiently noticed in comments on his works. Those higher 
qualities of reason and of humour have tended, it may be, to keep 
it out of sight. 

" I should be inclined to note two other peculiarities of his writ- 
ings, which have not been enough dwelt upon. One of these is, 
the suddenness with which he enters on his subject. No distant 
approaches by preface or dissertation. He plunges at once into 
his argument, and never loiters or lingers in it when he has com- 
passed his conclusion. In no case does he drain a subject to the 
dregs, but always leaves his readers lamenting that he has come to 
an end. 

" The other peculiarity (akin to the former, and often exceedingly 
happy in its effect) is what may be termed the unexpectedness of 
his manner of writing. He does not bind himself down to any 
servile rules of composition, or formal methods of argument. You 
always feel him to be a free and unshackled inquirer. He passes 
abruptly from one part of his subject to another, and, as suddenly, 
from exquisite wit to the gravest and most profound reason. 

" He was in truth equally fearless in the manner and method of 
his works, as in the opinions and conclusions it was his object to 
enforce." 

High as Mr Sydney Smith's reputation stood during his life, it 
has unquestionably risen since his death. If not more wide-spread, 
it is more just, and more worthy of his great moral and intellectual 
qualities. Still more perfect justice will, doubtless, be rendered to 
him by posterity. Admiration of his wit will become subordinate, 



PREFACE. 279 

as it ought to be, to respect for the purposes to which it was applied, 
and for the good sense by which it was guided. 

Already this appreciation has begun. And it is worthy of remark 
that the hasty and unregarded productions of his pen which were 
only saved from the flames by the pious hand of affection, have 
tended greatly to raise his reputation as a sound and original 
thinker. 

There is one other point upon which I feel bound by gratitude 
to touch. Within our times, no man has done so much to obtain 
for women toleration for the exercise of their understandings and 
for the culture of their talents, as Sydney Smith. Others have 
uttered louder complaints, and have put forward loftier claims, on 
their behalf. But in this, as in all his demands for reform, Sydney 
Smith kept within the bounds of the safe and the possible. To 
those who knew him it is unnecessary to declare that he had no 
desire to convert women into pedants, to divest them of any of the 
attributes or attractions of their sex, or to engage in the vain 
attempt to create for them a new and independent position in 
society. 

What he asked for women was, opportunity and encouragement 
to make themselves the intelligent companions of men of sense ; 
or to furnish themselves with ideas and pursuits which might give 
interest to lives otherwise insipid- and barren. These demands, 
consonant with nature and reason, he urged in a way to disarm 
opposition and vanquish prejudice. Sydney Smith was too com- 
pletely above cant and imposture to deny the influence and the 
value of youth and beauty. But he laboured to induce women to 
acquire some substitutes for beauty, some resources against old 
age, some power of commanding attention and respect when the 
victorious charms of youth have fled. A new era in the moral and 
intellectual condition of women dates from his Lectures at the 
Royal Institution. And though it is to be regretted that a task 
which might have worthily employed the most vigorous pen has 
devolved on female hands, it is by them, perhaps, that this tribute 
of respect, affection, and gratitude is most fitly paid. 

Sarah Austin. 

Cromer, October 1854. 

P.S. — I have generally omitted not only the usual formulae at the 
conclusion, of letters, but many continually recurring expressions 
of kindness and affection, friendly greetings, domestic news sought 
and communicated. They show his kindly recollections of great 
and small, but their repetition would occupy much space, and 
might become wearisome to the reader. 



280 PREFACE. 

It is not pretended that the following Letters are of equal merit 
and importance. They are, on the contrary, very unequal. The 
great object I had in view in their selection was, to present a true 
and complete picture of the writer under his various aspects ; to 
show that the formidable critic, the admired wit, the earnest and 
intrepid champion of truth and freedom, the man in whom honour, 
sincerity, and principle were paramount, was also full of kindly 
affections and generous indulgence ; and did not think it a waste 
of time and wit to delight the weaker part of mankind — women and 
children — with his playful sallies. The Letters are intended as 
illustrations of a thoroughly genuine, unaffected, and many-sided 
character ; and they bear the impress of the peculiar mood of the 
writer's mind, the peculiar circumstances by which he was sur- 
rounded, or the peculiar character and position of the person to 
whom they are addressed. 

This was the view taken by Mrs Sydney Smith. " Enough 
there is," she says, in a letter to me, " to show the affectionate play- 
fulness of his nature, his manly wisdom and goodness, and the 
calm and right-minded view he takes of politics and of human 
affairs in general. His honesty and his candour are also on every 
suitable occasion displayed, so we want nothing more for his just 
portraiture." 

If, in my ignorance of facts or*persons referred to in these Letters, 
I have suffered any allusion to pass which can give the slightest 
pain, I can only say it is not alone unintentional, but completely at 
variance with my intentions. Whatever be the faults of the selec- 
tion, I beg that it may be distinctly understood that they are to be 
imputed to me ; and that no portion of the responsibility rests on 
Lady Holland. She has been so good as to continue to me the 
confidence which her mother was pleased to repose in me, and my 
choice (out of the materials furnished to me) has been free. 

Lady Holland has most appropriately dedicated her Memoir to 
the memory of her mother. Be it permitted to me to add my re- 
spectful tribute to that faithful and devoted spirit which has inspired 
and directed my humble labours. To me, the foregoing selection 
will always appear her work. But for her entire confidence in the 
claims of him she had loved and revered through life, — a con- 
fidence which no discouragements could shake, — this volume would 
probably never have existed. It was she who collected, transcribed, 
and arranged the mass of letters out of which I had to choose, and 
who never could be brought to believe that the public would be in- 
different (as many thought) to such a life, or unimproved by such 
an example. If I have anything to congratulate myself upon, it is, 
that I never, for a moment, doubted she was right. 

Not that I was blind, to the difficulties. Mr Sydney Smith had 



PREFACE. 281 

long enjoyed a reputation perfectly unmatched for a gift the most 
dazzling, and the most evanescent of all intellectual gifts. Those 
who had heard him talk, felt with a sort of despair, how pale a 
shadow of the reality any description of him must inevitably be. 
Many, if not most, of his surviving friends and associates looked 
coldly on the project : and it seemed to be the general opinion that 
there was " nothing to tell," and that any attempt to draw an endur- 
ing portrait of the most brilliant of conversers would be a failure. 

But all this was no answer to one who rested his claims to the 
admiration and respect of mankind on far higher qualities. To 
convey to others her own conviction of his eminent virtues, was the 
one remaining deep and earnest purpose of her life. Nothing could 
be more affecting and more venerable than this resolute struggle of 
a loving heart with the difficulties in the way of the accomplishment 
of its pious wishes. Her pride in her husband was only equalled 
by her humility about herself: and nothing could persuade her 
that she was competent to do what she so intensely longed to see 
done. I may, I hope, be excused for quoting a few sentences from 
the many touching letters I received from Mrs Sydney Smith, while 
this struggle was going on. 

I am encouraged to do this by some words from one of the few 
surviving early friends of Mr Sydney Smith ; one whose opinion is 
entitled to the utmost deference — Lord Murray. " If," he says, 
" you could add anything to what you have already said in your 
Preface* respecting Mrs Sydney Smith's urgent desire that some 
account of her husband's life should be written, you would no way 
exceed the truth ; for it was a matter constantly weighing on her 
mind during the last years of her life. Lady Holland must there- 
fore have felt herself bound, as a matter of duty, to do what she has 
done." 

In December 1845, Mrs Sydney Smith wrote to me : — "Most per- 
sons, of whose good sense and discretion I have a high estimate, think 
that any little Memoir, illustrated by genuine letters, it would be 
yet too soon to publish. I confess it is foregoing the last gratifica- 
tion that remains to me — the hope of seeing that published of him, 
which to me far exceeds all the brilliancy of head that the world 
took cognizance of, but which I least valued ; well knowing what 
the world knew not, the perfection of his heart, and his fearless love 
of truth. If delayed, I can never hope to see it : but I am not so 
selfish as for an instant to oppose my own gratification to that 
which is deemed expedient for his sake. Much did I wish Lord 
Jeffrey to have done this, but his age and infirmities press too 
hardly upon him now." 

In March 1846, she writes : — " I shall never see the completion 

* To the unpublished edition. 



28a PREFACE. 

of the Memoir it would have been such an unspeakable satisfaction 
to me to see perfected. Some, the best judging perhaps, say it is 
too soon, as the letters and incidents relate tc many living persons. 
I have therefore yielded up the great and now only remaining 
delight I could have felt, at the suggestion of the wiser and more 
fastidious of my friends ; in the meantime I go on collecting." 
I n June 1 849, I received the following letter : — 

" My dear Mrs Austin, 

'•' I hardly know how to make my request, so sensible am I to 
the liberty I am about to take with you ; but to waste no more of 
your time in words, I will at once state my earnest desire. 

"Much more that is excellent of my dear husband is deserving of 
notice than is derivable from his ' Works ; ' yet who will record it ? 
Of his great talents he has himself taken care : of these, no one 
doubts. Of the far more admirable qualities of his mind and heart, 
the world knows nothing ! His play-fellows are almost all gone. 
Who that well knew him, and is capable of appreciating him, will 
undertake the task ? . . . 

" I prefer writing, rather than saying my wishes to you, because 
it will be less painful to you to write ' No ' than to speak it, should 
my anxious desire prove objectionable to you." 

After repeated endeavours on my part to induce Mrs Sydney to 
seek some more competent Editor, I received a letter containing 
these words : — " My days, I suspect, cannot be many, and thence 
my urgency. Pray attribute it to the real motive — the desire to 
see that done which shall fill up the measure of my wishes. I have 
arranged his letters by the years and months, so that he indirectly 
tells the incidents of his own life. But now comes my own incapa- 
city. I think every word he ever wrote so precious, that my better 
judgment is blinded, and I should not be able to erase a line or a 
thought. Here I greatly want one on whose just perception, on 
whose right feelings of affectionate regard not only for him, but for 
his fame, I can implicitly rely." 

But though she speaks of her incapacity, the following passage 
trom a subsequent letter shows what a just and distinct conception 
she had formed of what ought to be attempted : — 

" An eventless life must be made up of character, of comments 
by friends, of a narrative of the immense difficulties through which, 
without interest, without connections, with the heavy weight of 
poverty on his shoulders, he dared bravely and honestly, and at all 
hazards, to struggle against bigotry, and every kind of abuse that 
militated against human happiness, but which struggle was sure to 
lessen his own chance of success. 



PREFACE. 283 

" Such mixed materials cannot come up to the magnitude of his 
deserts ; yet if it be the only thing that remains to his survivors to 
do, that the memory of so much that was admirable and affec- 
tionate in private life, as well as great and noble in the wider range 
of human interests (which he ever strenuously advocated) may not 
perish, it is surely expedient that it should be done. It is only in 
the fulness and freshness of familiar correspondence that are illus- 
trated the genuine feelings and character." 

Such were the influences under which I undertook my task. 
Fortunately for the public, ill-health prevented my attempting the 
more important part of it, which has thus fallen into the only hands 
competent to do it justice. The humbler portion which I retained 
has been executed with constant reference to the wishes and 
opinions of her from whom I received my commission, and to 
whom, though departed, I have never ceased to consider myself 
responsible. 

SARAH AUSTIN. 

Weybridge^ May 21st, 1855. 



LETTERS. 



i.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Broomsgrove y 1801. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

Why so modest as to stand for a place in Scotland ? Who 
humbled you into a notion that you were sufficiently destitute of 
probity, originality, and talents to enjoy a chance of success ? I 
left you with far more adequate conceptions of yourself, — with 
ingentes aminos angusto in corpore ; I left you with a permanent 
and ingenuous blush for your venal city, and in a short month you 
deem yourself qualified in corruption to be a candidate for its 
honours.* 

Many thanks, my dear Jeffrey, for the pleasant expressions of 
goodwill your letter contains. The friendship of worthy, sensible 
men I look upon as the greatest blessing of life. I have always 
felt myself flattered that you did not consider my society beneath 
your attention. 

I think to be at Edinburgh about the end of August. We will 
pass many evenings together, arguing and joking, amidst eating 
and drinking ! above all, being stupid when we feel inclined, — a 
rare privilege of friendship, of which I am frequently glad to avail 
myself. It will cost me much to tear myself away from Scotland, 
which however I must do when the fulness of time is come. I 
shall be like a full-grown tree transplanted, — deadly sick at first, 
with bare and ragged fibres, shorn of many a root ! 

Remember me to the aged Horner, and the more aged Seymour : 
I love these sages well. I think Leyden had better take Scotch 
preferment first, which will leave his chance for Indian appoint- 
ments in statu quo, and put a hundred pounds a year in his pocket. 
I cannot imagine that your despondency in your profession can be 
rational ; but however, you know that profession, and I know you, 
and when we meet, it will make a good talk over hyson. 

Remember me to little ; she is a clever little girl, but 

* This was written during the dictatorship of Dundas (afterwards Lord Melville). 



'M LETTERS OF THE REV SYDNEY SMITH. 

full of indiscretion, and inattentive to women, which is a bad style 
of manners. 

Parr I know perfectly well ; his conversation is infinitely beyond 
his books, as his fame is beyond his merits. Mackintosh is coming 
to Edinburgh, I believe, where I suppose you will see him. 

My dear Jeffrey, Mrs S. sends her best compliments. 

Sydney Smith, 






2.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

July, 1801. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

After a vertigo of one fortnight in London, I am undergoing that 
species of hybernation, or suspended vitality, called a pleasant fort- 
night in the country. I behave myself quietly and decently, as 
becomes a corpse, and hope to regain the rational and immortal 
part of my composition about the 20th of this month. 

Nothing has pleased me more in London than the conversation 
of Mackintosh. I never saw so theoretical a head which contained 
so much practical understanding. He has lived much among 
various men with great observation, and has always tried his pro- 
found moral speculations by the experience of life. He has not 
contracted in the world a lazy contempt for theorists, nor in the 
closet a peevish impatience of that grossness and corruptibility of 
mankind, which are ever marring the schemes of secluded benevo- 
lence. He does not wish for the best in politics or morals, but 
for the best which can be attained ; and what that is he seems to 
know well. Now what / object to Scotch philosophers in general 
is, that they reason upon man as they would upon a divinity ; 
they pursue truth, without caring if it be useful truth. They are 
more fond of disputing on mind and matter than on anything which 
can hav« a reference to the real world, inhabited by real men, 
women, and children,* a philosopher that descends to the present 
state of things is debased in their estimation. Look amongst our 
friends in Edinburgh, and see if there be not some truth in this. 
I do not speak of great prominent literary personages, but of the 
mass of reflecting men in Scotland. 

Mackintosh is going to India as lecturer • I wish you could find 
a similar situation in that country, but not before /leave Scotland. 
I think it would be more to your taste than the Scotch Bar ; and 
yet you want nothing to be a great lawyer ; and nothing to be a 
great speaker, but a deeper voice, slower and more simple utter- 
ance, more humility of face and neck, and a greater contempt for 
esprit, than men who have so 7nuch in general attain to. 

I have not the least idea when I shall return to Edinburgh • I 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 287 

hope, the beginning of August. There seems to be no belief in in- 
vasion, and none in plots, which are now become so ridiculous that 
every one laughs at them. 

Read Parr's sermon, and tell me how you like it. I think it dull, 
with occasional passages of eloquence. His notes are very enter- 
taining. You will find in them a great compliment to my brother. 

Sydney Smith. 



3.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Burntisland, June, 1802. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

With the inculpative part of your criticisms on mine I very much 
agree ; and, in particular, am so well aware of that excessive levity 
into which I am apt to run, that I think I shall correct it. 

Upon the point of severity, I beg you to recollect the facts. 

That is a very stupid and a very contemptible fellow no one 

pretends to deny. He has been hangman for these ten years to all 
the poor authors in England, is generally considered to be hired by 
Government, and has talked about Social Order till he has talked 
himself into ^600 or ^700 per annum. That there can be a fairer 
object for critical severity I cannot conceive ; and though he be not 
notorious in Edinburgh, he is certainly so in London. If you think 
that the violence of the attack may induce the generality of readers 
to sympathise with the sufferer rather than with the executioner, in 
spite of the recollection that the artificer of death is perishing by 
his own art, then your objections to my criticism are good, for the 
very opposite reason to that you have alleged ; not because they 
are too severe, but because, by diminishing the malice of the 
reader, they do not attain the maximum of severity. 

You say the readers will think my review long. Probably. If 
it is amusing, they will not : if it is dull, I am sorry for it, — but 
I can write no better. I am so desirous of attacking this time- 
serving , that I cannot consent to omit this article, unless my 

associates consider their moral and religious characters committed 
by it ; at the same time, I will, with great pleasure, attempt to 
modify it. 

I am very much obliged to you for your animadversions on my 
inaccuracies, and should be obliged to you also to correct them. 
One of the instances you mention is rather awkward than incorrect, 
but had better be amended. I wrote my views exactly as you see 
them ; though I certainly made these blunders, not in consequence 
of neglect, but in spite of attention. 

I will come over soon if I can, not to detect Scotticisms, but to 



288 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

enjoy the company of Scotchmen. Just now I am expecting Dugald 
Stewart and his spouse. 

I have been so very bitter lately against authors, and find so much 
of the infusum amanuu still remaining in my style, that I am 
afraid you will not think my answer to your expostulation a very 
gracious one. If you do think so, pray think otherwise ; you can- 
not be too candid with me. You will very often find me too vain 
for correction, but never so blind to the value of a frank and manly 
character as not to feel real gratitude, when it consults my good, by 
pointing out my errors. 

Sydney Smith. 



4.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Tuxford, 1803. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

Your very kind letter I received at the very moment of departure. 
I left Edinburgh with great heaviness of heart ; I knew what I was 
leaving, and was ignorant to what I was going. My good fortune 
will be very great, if I should ever again fall into the society of so 
many liberal, correct, and instructed men, and live with them on 
such terms of friendship as I have done with you, and you know 
whom, at Edinburgh. I cannot see what obligations you are under 
to me ; but I have so little objection to your thinking so, that I 
certainly shall not attempt to undeceive you in that opinion, or in 
any other which is likely to make you think of me more frequently 
or more kindly. 

I have found the country everywhere full of spirit, and you are 
the only male despondent I have yet met with. Every one else 
speaks of the subjugation of England as of the subjugation of the 
Minotaur, or any other history in the mythological dictionary. 
God bless you, my dear Jeffrey ! I shall always feel a pride 
and happiness in calling myself, and in showing myself, your 
friend. 

S. S. 

P.S. — I beg leave to except the Tuxford waiter, who desponds 
exactly as you do. 



5.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

No date : about 1803. 
Dear Jeffrey, 
Though Mrs Jeffrey will not let you come for any length of time, 
will she not permit you to come for two days, if we give bond to 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 289 

send you back on Wednesday ? Pray reply to this interrogation 
by return of post, and in the affirmative if you can. I beg leave 
to disagree both with Horner and yourself about " Etymologicon 
Magnum," which I think written with great spirit and dexterity of 
manner, and with acuteness and justness in point of argument. I 
think some of your expressions incorrect, but you are not too civil 
by a single bow or smile ; you have your imagination in very good 
order through the whole of it, and I exhort you to think extremely 
well of your power of writing — a task which, I trust, you will not 
find very unpleasant or difficult. The other subjects of your note 
I will reserve till we meet. 

Sydney Smith. 



6.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

77 Upper Guildford Street, 
November 30, 1803. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I have the pleasure of informing you that it is the universal 
opinion of all the cleverest men I have met with here, that our Re- 
view is uncommonly well done, and that it is perhaps the first in 
Europe. I shall return with a million compliments, and some offers 

of assistance. I have thoroughly talked over the matter with , 

and shall give you the result of our conversation. 

If any book enjoys a greater reputation here than you can con- 
jecture it would from its title, we may send you information of 
it ; and for a monthly search for foreign books you may depend 
upon us. 

I will stop such books as I want myself ; but you had better give 
Horner a caution against stopping more books than he wants, as he 
is a sort of literary tiger, whose den is strewed with ten times more 
victims than he can devour. 

Your journey to India must entirely depend upon the influence of 
Mackintosh with Government upon literary topics ; he is much in- 
clined to befriend you ; but the whole business is in a very glimmer- 
ing state, and you must not think much about it. 

We are all well. I have been spending three or four days in 
Oxford in a contested election ; Horner went down with me, and 
was much entertained. I was so delighted with Oxford after my 
long absence, that I almost resolved to pass the long vacation there 
with my family, amid the shades of the trees and the silence of the 
monasteries. Horner is to come down too : will you join us ? We 
would settle the fate of nations, and believe ourselves (as all three 

T 



290 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

or four men who live together do) the sole repositories of knowledge, 
liberality, and acuteness. 

I will endeavour to send you a sheet as soon as possible, but can- 
not do so as soon as you mention. 

Sydney Smith. 



7.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

London (no date, but either 1803 or 1804). 
8 Doughty Street. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I send you all that you are to expect from me. The geographical 
names, which are so badly written, you will be able to decipher by 
the assistance of Tooke's " Survey of the Russian Empire ;" you 
will exercise your editorial functions of blotting and correcting at 
full liberty. In my last letter I objected strongly to hackney 
writers ; I do so still ; perhaps I shall be able, in course of time, 
to discover some very useful coadjutors above this rank. 

Everybody speaks in high terms of the Review, and deprecates 
any idea of its extinction ; strain every nerve to keep it up ; it will 
give you reputation. 

Playfair has supped with me. Of Horner business has pre- 
vented me from seeing much ; he lives very high up in Gordon 
Court, and thinks a good deal about mankind ; I have a great 
veneration and affection for him, and depend upon him for a good 
deal of my society. Yours kindly, 

Sydney Smith. 



8.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Londoii {fto date, presumed 1803 or 1804). 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I believe I have transmitted to you, for this number, as much as 
will make two sheets, which was the amount I promised. I would 
have been better than my promise, but for reasons unfortunately 
too good. We shall be most truly glad to see you in England, but 
what will become of the articles in your absence ? for, situated as 
you are, your whole life is a crisis. 

Mrs Sydney is pretty well and slowly recovering from her shock,* 
of which your kindness and your experience enable you to ascertain 
the violence. Children are horribly insecure ; the life of a parent 
is the life of a gambler. • 

* The loss of her infant son. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 291 

I have seen Erskine. Murray will tell you how he appear? to 
me ; but a man coming from Dunse to London is of course stunned, 
and he must be a very impudent or a very wonderful man if he is 
not. Do you know anybody who would go out Professor to a 
Russian University ? — about ,£800 per annum, coals and candles 
gratis, and travelling expenses allowed, if sent to Siberia. A perfect 
deadnessin the literary world. Your friend Mackintosh sails early 
in January, to the universal sorrow of his friends. 

The Swintons are come to town, and are to bring me your 
portrait, as large as life I presume, as Mr Swinton says in his note, 
" 1 will put in my pocket a little parcel I have for you/' You see I 
am as impertinent as ever, and I assure you, my dear Jeffrey, as 
affectionate towards you. 

Sydney Smith. 



9.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Londofi, 1804. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I can hardly believe my own eyes when they inform me that I 
am up, dressed, and writing by eight o'clock in the morning ; and 
as there is nobody near by whose perceptions I can rectify my own, 
the fact will probably be undecided through the whole of my letter. 
To put the question to an intellectual test, I have tried an act of 
memory, and endeavoured to form a distinct image of the editor of 
the Edinburgh Review ; but he appears to me of a stature so 
incredibly small, that I cannot venture to say I am awake, and my 
mind in a healthy and vigorous state : however, you must take me 
as you find me. Talking of the Edinburgh Review, I hardly 
think the article on Dumont is much liked by those whose praise 
I should be most desirous you should obtain ; though it conciliates 
the favour of men who are always ready to join in a declaration of 
war against all works of speculation and philosophical enterprise ; 
but when I speak in dispraise of this article, I only contrast it with 
what you have done better ; for, in spite of its errors (if any such 
there be), it would make the fortune of anybody else. 

I certainly, my dear Jeffrey, in conjunction with the Knight of 
the Shaggy Eyebrows,* do protest against your increasing and 
unprofitable scepticism. I exhort you to restrain the violent 
tendency of your nature for analysis, and to cultivate synthetical 
propensities. What is virtue ? What 's the use of truth ? What 's 

the use of honour ? What 's a guinea but a d d yellow circle ? 

The whole effort of your mind is to destroy. Because others build 
slightly and eagerly, you employ yourself in kicking down their 

* Francis Horner, Esq. 



292 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

houses, and contract a sort of aversion for the more honourable, 
useful, and difficult task of building well yourself. 

I think you ought to know Horner too well by this time to expect 
his article on Malthus before you sec it. 

The satire against me I have not yet read. One of the charges 
against me is, I understand, that I am ugly ; but this is a mere 
falsehood, and a plain proof that the gentleman never can have 
seen me. I certainly am the best-looking man concerned with the 
Review, and this John Murray* has been heard to say behind 
my back. Pray tell the said J. Murray that three ladies, apparently 
much agitated, have been here to inquire his direction, calling him 
a base, perfidious young man. 

I am extremely sorry for poor Alison : he is a man of great 
delicacy, and will be hurt by the attack of this scoundrel. Dumont 
is certainly displeased with the Review. Most sincerely and 
affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



io.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

London, 1804 {or 1805). 

is here, and will certainly settle in Scotland next 

winter. She is, for a woman, well-informed and very liberal : 
neither is she at all disagreeable ; but the information of very plain 
women is so inconsiderable, that I agree with you in setting no 
very great store by it. I am no great physiognomist, nor have I 
much confidence in a science which pretends to discover the inside 
from the out ; but where I have seen fine eyes, a beautiful com- 
plexion, grace and symmetry, in women, I have generally thought 
them amazingly well-informed and extremely philosophical. In 
contrary instances, seldom or ever. Is there any accounting for 
this ? 

John Playfair dined here yesterday, and met Whishaw. We had 
a pleasant day, — at least I had. 

If I can meet with any one who I think will do for the Review, I 
will certainly stimulate him. Such a man is Malthus, — but you 
ha.ve many workmen of that stamp. 

Tell Jus Thompson that Miss Fox thinks his review of Darwin 
one of the most sensible in the whole book. Exhort him also never 
to forget the battle of Galen's head, and that I shared with him the 
danger. God bless you, dear Jeffrey ! 

• Sydney Smith. 

* Now a Lord of Session, and one of the few early and faithful friends of Sydney 
Smith still surviving.— Ed. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 293 

11.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

No date, but believed about 1805. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

You are raving mad if you take the least notice of . Let 

nothing — not even the pleasantry and success of an answer you 
might write — tempt you to do it. It is quite out of his power to 
do you the least harm, and out of yours to do him any : he is 
perfectly invulnerable by his degradation, and, from the same cause, 
innoxious. I beg and entreat you to lay aside all thoughts of an 
answer. I have read through his pamphlet, and never read such 
dull trash. What is the history of my escape ? 

I cannnot say I am much struck with your Reid. I do not quite 
agree with you in your observation upon the science of metaphysics, 
nor with the difference you have attempted to establish between 
observation and experiment ; but there is in that article quite 
enough of acuteness, good sense, and good writing to render it an 
ornament to the work, the character of which will not, in my opinion, 
suffer by the present number. The two articles which pleased me 
most were Izarn and D'Agnesi ; I suspect them both to be from 

Playfair. 's review is too coarse — some parts absolutely 

ungentlemanlike. The great horror of the review is the ge in gelidus 
being made long ; I was forced to break it to Elmsley by degrees. 

If I were to write on in the Review, I would certainly not conceal 
myself, but I am much afraid it may not be in my power. I am 
engaging in my profession, and determined to write a book. We 
shall be heartily glad to see you if you come here. You will take 

some time in getting acquainted with the R s, but you will 

succeed at last, and they are really worth the trouble ; but do not 
talk lightly before them on serious subjects, — you will terrify them 
to death. I shall always love Edinburgh very dearly. I know no 
man of whose understanding and principles I have a higher opinion 
than I have of yours. I will come and visit Edinburgh very often 
if I am ever rich, and I think it very likely one day or another I 
may live there entirely. I write with a bad headache, but I write 
speedily to remonstrate, in the strongest manner, against your 
pamphlet. I am sure John Murray will agree with me : my kindest 
regards to him ; he is an admirable man. Adieu ! 

Sydney Smith. 



294 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

12.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

February j 1805. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I thought you had entirely forgotten me, and was pleasing myself 
with the notion that you were rising in the world, that your income 
was tripling and quadrupling in value, and that you were going 
through the customary and concomitant process of shedding your 
old friends and the companions of your obscurity, — when, behold ! 
your letter arrived, diminished your income, blunted your fame, and 
restored your character. 

As for me, I am plagued to death with lectures, sermons, &c. ; 
and am afraid I have rather overloaded myself. I got through my 
first course I think creditably 3 whether any better than creditably, 
others know better than myself. I have still ten to read, have written 
two upon wit and humour, and am proceeding to write three upon 
taste. What the subject of the others will be I know not. I wish 
I had your sanity and fertility at my elbow, to resort to in cases of 
dulness and difficulty. 

I am extremely glad, however, upon the whole, that I have en- 
gaged in the thing, and think that it will do me good, and hereafter 
amuse me, when I have more leisure. 

I have not seen much of your friend Bell,* but mean to see more 
of him. He is modest, amiable, and full of zeal and enterprise in 
his profession. I could not have conceived that anything could be 
so perfect and beautiful as his wax models. I saw one to-day 
which was quite the Apollo Belvidere of morbid anatomy. 

Horner is a very happy man ; his worth and talents are acknow- 
ledged by the world at a more early period than those of any inde- 
pendent and upright man I ever remember. He verifies an 
observation I have often made, that the world do not dislike 
originality, liberality, and independence so much as the insulting 
arroga?ice with which they are almost always accompanied. Now, 
Horner pleases the best judges, and does not offend the worst. 

God bless you, my dear Jeffrey ! — is the prayer of your sincere 
friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



13.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Doughty Street, April, 1805 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I should be very much obliged to you to transmit the enclosed 
testimonials to St Andrews, to pay for the degree, to send me word" 

* The late Sir Charles Bell. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 295 

how much you have paid for it, and I will repay you immediately. 
If there be any form neglected, then send us information how to 
proceed. The degree itself may be sent to me also, by the mail or 
post, according to its size. Pray do not neglect this affair, as the 
interests of a poor and respectable man depend upon it. 

My lectures are just now at such an absurd pitch of celebrity, 
that I must lose a good deal of reputation before the public settles 
into a just equilibrium respecting them. I am most heartly ashamed 
of my own fame, because I am conscious I do not deserve it, and 
that the moment men of sense are provoked by the clamour to 
look into my claims, it will be at an end. 

Sydney Smith. 



14.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Doughty Street, 1805. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

Many thanks to you for your goodness. My little boy is, thank 
God, recovered. I sat up with him for two nights, expecting every 
moment would be his last. My great effort was to keep up Mrs 
Sydney's spirits, in which I succeeded tolerably well. I will not 
exercise my profession of preaching commonplaces to you ; I 
acknowledge your loss was a heavy calamity, for I can measure 
what you felt by what I felt for you. 

You have raised up to yourself here, individually, a very high 
and solid reputation by your writings in the Edinburgh Review. 
You are said to be the ablest man in Scotland ; and other dainty 
phrases are used about you, which show the effect you have pro- 
duced. Mackintosh, ever anxious to bring men of merit into 
notice, is the loudest of your panegyrists, and the warmest of your 
admirers. I have now had an opportunity of appreciating the 
manner in which the Review is felt, and I do assure you it has 
acquired a most brilliant and extensive reputation. 

Follow it up, by all means. On the first of every month, Horner 
and I will meet together, and order books for Edinburgh : this we 
can do from the monthly lists. In addition, we will scan the French 
booksellers' shops, and send you anything valuable, excepting a 
certain portion that we will reserve for ourselves. We will, in this 
division, be just and candid as we can ; if you do not think us so, 
let us know. You will have the lists, and can order for yourselves 
any books not before ordered for you ; many catalogue articles I 
will take, to avoid the expense of sending them backwards and 
forwards from Edinburgh to London : many I will send. The 
articles I shall review from No. 6 are " Iceland," Goldbering's 



296 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

" Travels into Africa," and S£guf upon the " Influence of Women 
in Society." I shall not lose sight of the probability of procuring 
assistance ; some, I am already asking for. You will not need 
from me more than two sheets, I presume. Pray tell me the names 
of the writers of this number. Mackintosh says there has been no 
such book upon Political Economy as Brougham's since the days 
of Adam Smith. 

S. S. 



15.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

1805. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
. Many thanks to you for your attention to my diploma. When 
you send me a statement of expenses, I will give you a draft for the 
money ; by statement, I mean amount. 

I conclude my lectures next Saturday. Upon the whole, I think 
I have done myself some little good by them. 

I think your last articles in the Edinburgh Review extremely 
able, and by no means inferior to what you have done before. 

John Allen is come home, in very high favour with Lord and Lady 
Holland. They say he is, without exception, the best-tempered 
man that ever lived, very honourable, and of an understanding 
superior to most people ; in short, they do him complete justice. 
He is very little altered, except that he appears to have some faint 
notions that all the world are not quite so honourable and excellent 
as himself. I have the highest respect for John Allen. 

I wrote to Dugald Stewart, to tell him of a report which prevailed 
here, that the General Assembly had ordered him to drink a Scotch 
pint of hemlock, which he had done, discoursing about the gods to 
Playfair and Darcy !* 

Best regards to Tim Thompson. When am I to see you again, 
and John Murray, and everybody in the North whom I love and 
respect ? 

Sydney Smith. 



16.] To Dr Reeve f— (Vienna). 

8 Doughty Street, Brunswick Square, 
October t.% 1805. 
My dear Sir, 
I suggested everything I could to Barnard; told him that 

* Mrs Dugald Stewart. 

t Dr Reeve was a pupil of Mr Martineau, an eminent surgeon at Norwich. He after- 
wards studied medicine at Edinburgh, where he enjoyed the friendship of Mr Sydney 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 297 

you had made three distinct efforts to come home, and had 
been robbed as many times by armed chaplains of the Austrian 
army ; that Dr De Roches had been wounded in the right glontean, 
and you yourself thrown into a smart tertian by your grief and 
anxiety. The committee will not bind themselves to make a new 
engagement with you, but I have no doubt you will secure your 
situation upon your return. 

I will, in the meantime, do all I can to get you inserted in the 
list for spring, 1807, which comes out, I think, about May 1806. 

I would advise you not to fling away this occasion, which is no 
despicable one, for a physician ; because he must be a very clumsy 
gentleman if, in lecturing upon the moral and physical nature of 
man, he cannot take an opportunity of saying that he lives at 
No. 6 Chancery Lane, and that few people are equal to him in the 
cure of fevers. As to the improvement you get, my dear doctor, 
in travelling abroad, credat Judccus ! You have seen a skull of a 
singular conformation at Dr Baumgarten's, and seen a toe in 
Suabia, which astonished you ; but what, in the name of Dr Gre- 
gory, can you see in Germany of a therapeutic nature which you 
cannot see better in Scotland or here ? You will do yourself more 
real good by superintending one woman of quality in London, than 
by drinking tea with all the German professors that ever existed. 

All these events in Germany have not astonished me : I allowed 
Buonaparte twenty-eight days to knock both armies chines super 
caput (as the vulgar have it), to conclude peace, make a speech to 
the Senate, and illuminate Paris. He is as rapid and as terrible as 
the lightning of God ; would he were as transient ! Ah ! my dear 
doctor, you are of a profession which will endure for ever ; no re- 
volutions will put an end to Synochus and Synoche ; but what will 
become of the spoils we gather from the earth ? those cocks of ripe 
farina, on which the holy bough is placed — the tithes ! Adieu — God 
bless you ! I will watch over your interests, and if anything occur, 
write to you again. 

Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — I think, upon reflection, you had better write a line to the 
committee, stating the impossibility of your coming home, though 
you strongly wish, and begging to be put on the list for spring, 
1807. Add also that you will employ the intervening time in col- 
lecting materials for your lectures. Send it to me ; never mind 
postage. 

Smith, Mr Homer, and other founders of the Edinburgh Review, and was among the 
early contributors to that journal. At the time this letter was written, he was travelling 
on the Continent with his friend Dr De Roches, of Geneva, who had also studied at 
Edinburgh. Dr Reeve afterwards married the elder daughter of Mr John Taylor, of 
Norwich, and settled at that place. He died in the year 1814.— Ed. 



2Q8 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

17.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

18 Orchard Street, London, 1806. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I thank you for your kind and friendly letter, which gave me 
great pleasure. I am exempted at present from residence, as 
preacher to the Foundling Hospital; had it been otherwise, I could, 
I think, have lived very happily in the country, in armigeral, priestly, 
and swine-feeding society. I have given up the Royal Institution. 
My wife and children are well, and the world at present goes pros- 
perously with me. I shall pass part of next summer at my living, 
and in all probability come over to Edinburgh. Sharp, Bodding- 
ton, Philips, and Horner come into Parliament this session. I say 
nothing of foreign politics in the present state of the world : we 
live and hope only from quarter-day to quarter-day. I shall pro- 
bably remain nearly in the state I am now in till next midsummer. 
I have not a thought beyond ; perhaps it is rash to think so far. 
I have seen Stewart once ; he seems tormented to death with 
friends, but he talked out about Paris very fairly and pleasantly. 

Tell Murray that I was much struck with the politeness of Miss 
Markham the day after he went. In carving a partridge, I splashed 
her with gravy from head to foot ; and though I saw three distinct 
brown rills of animal-juice trickling down her cheek, she had the 
complaisance to swear that not a drop had reached her ! Such 
circumstances are the triumphs of civilised life. 

I shall be truly happy to see you again. What do you mean by 
saying we shall meet soon ? Have you any immediate thoughts of 
coming to London ? Remember me kindly to Murray, Thomson, 
Alison, Playfair, &c. I am very glad you see so much of these 
latter personages. Tell Playfair I have presented the four copies 
of his book to four of the most beautiful women of my acquaintance, 
with his particular compliments and regards. 

Sydney Smith. 



18.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Orchard Street, 1806. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
You will be surprised, after my last letter, to hear from me so 
soon again, and that my assistance in the next number must be left 
doubtful. Some circumstances have occurred, of consequence 
only to myself, which will entirely occupy my time, and render it 
impossible to do the articles well, if I can do them at all. I have 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 299 

to apologise to you for this apparent mutability, but I am quite 
certain you would justify me if you knew my reasons. 

The present Administration have put nobody into Parliament : 
they are too strong to want clever young men. 

I must be candid with you, my dear Jeffrey, and tell you that I 
do not like your article on the Scotch Courts ; and with me think 
many persons whose opinions I am sure you would respect. I 
subscribe to none of your reasonings, hardly, about juries ; and the 
manner in which you have done it is far from happy. You have 
made, too, some egregious mistakes about English law, pointed out 
to me by one of the first lawyers in the King's Bench. I like 
to tell you these things, because you never do so well as when 
you are humbled and frightened, and if you could be alarmed into 
the semblance of modesty, you would charm everybody ; but re- 
member my joke against you about the moon ; — " D — n the solar 
system ! bad light — planets too distant — pestered with comets — 
feeble contrivance ; — could make a better with great ease." 

I sincerly hope you will be up here in the spring. It is long- 
since we met, and I want to talk over old and new times with you. 
God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



19.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Orchard Street, 1806. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I saw, of course, a good deal of Timotheus while he was here. 
After breathing for a year the free air of London, his caution struck 
me as rather ludicrous ; but I liked him very much : he is a very 
honest, good-natured, sensible man. 

I have just blinked at the Review, and that is all. Constable 
has omitted to send quarterly tributes of reviews to Horner and 
to me ; — to me, the original proposer of the Review, and to Horner, 
the frumentarious philosopher ! If he is ever again guilty of a 
similar omission, he shall be pulled down from his present emi- 
nence. 

The other day I went to the Panorama. There was near me a 
party consisting of one old and three young women ; and what do 
you think was the subject of their conversation ? — which was the 
handsomest, John or William Murray ! I am not joking ; it is 
really true, upon my honour. There seemed to be a decided 
majority in favour of John, on account of his fairness. William 
Murray will not believe it. 

I don't know whether you agree with me about the present Ian- 



300 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

guage and divisions of intellectual philosophy. They appear to 
me to be in a most barbarous state, and to be found nowhere in a 
state of higher confusion and puzzle than in the "Intellectual 
Powers" o'f Dr Reid. I have got a little insight into metaphysics 
by these lectures of mine ; and though I am not learned enough to 
cope with you, I think I could understand you, and make myself 
understood by you. Do you agree with Stewart in his doctrine of 
sleep ? — in his belief of the existence of conceptions ? — in his divi- 
sions between sensation and perception ? — in the propriety of the 
language he holds about ideas gained by the senses? I do not. 
Tell me if you do ; yes or no, simpliciter. 

Sydney Smith. 



20.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

i 8 Orchard Street, Dec. 21, 1806. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

It gives me great pleasure to think of visiting Scotland in the 
summer ; but the drawback will be, to leave my wife and children, 
which I assure you I am loath to do for a single day. 

Brougham is just returned from Portugal. It is rumoured that 
he was laid hold of by the Inquisition, and singed with wax-tapers, 
on account of the Edinburgh Review. They were at first about to 
use flambeaux, conceiving him to be you ; but, upon recurring to 
the notes they have made of your height, an error was discovered 
of two feet, and the lesser fires only administered ! 

If I should be inclined to write anything for the Edinburgh 
Review this time, what books remain vacant? Have the goodness 
to send me a list, or, if that be difficult, send me a list of what 
books are appropriated ; and I will immediately determine upon 
some or none, and inform you of my determination. By what 
period must my task be completed, if I undertake it ? 

I am resolved to write some'book, but I do not know what book. 
If I fail, I shall soon forget the ridicule ; if I succeed, I shall never 
forget the praise. The pleasure of occupation I am sure of, and I 
hardly think my failure can be very complete. 

I have totally forgotten the Prussian monarchy since the third 
day after its destruction ; nor will I think of destruction till the 
battlements of Troy are falling round my head, and I see Neptune 
stirring^up its foundations with his trident ! Why should we be 
ravished and ruined daily ? 

Sydney Smith. . 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 301 

ai.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

No date : supposed 1 807. 
Dear Jeffrey, 
Concerning the Review, I think the whole number exceedingly- 
good. Playfair's article is very much liked, and does not owe its 
success to its attack upon a bishop against whom everybody sym- 
pathises, but has genuine merit. Were I to criticise it at all, I 
should say it was rather Doric. Brougham's is most able, and the 
censure amply merited. Locke's " Tennant " I should suspect to 
be very green and crude, though I have not yet read much of it. 
These are all the articles of which I have heard any opinion, or 
which I have noticed. There are several Scotticisms in Playfair's 

review. I like very much, without caring about meeting him. 

I think his subjects of charcoal and chalk are very inferior ones, 
and that there is a good deal of bad taste in him, though that is 
in some degree atoned for by his propensity to the good and the 
liberal. I have no alloy to mingle in my approbation of Playfair. 

Brown is an impracticable, excellent creature. Of I can 

really form no tolerable opinion : contrasting him with his high 
character ; his ordinary nullity, with his occasional specimens of 
extraordinary penetration, fine taste, and comprehensive observa- 
tion, I am puzzled to silence : he is a man whom I cannot make 
out. Brougham impresses me more and more with a notion of his 
talents and acquisitions. No change has happened to me in my 
prospects. I sincerely hope your journey to the country will quite 
re-establish Mrs Jeffrey's health ; and I beg you will let me know 
in your next letter. There is nothing I long for so much as to pay 
you a visit in the North . the first acquisition of riches with which 
I am visited shall be consecrated to that object. 

Sydney Smith. 



22.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

London, 1807. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I may perhaps furnish you with a sheet this time. Nothing but 
illness or occupation will prevent me. It is not pro'bable that 
these causes of interruption will occur, but I beg to provide 
against them in case they do. I wish you could give Constable a 
lecture respecting his inattention to the contributors to the Review. 
Everybody gets the Review before me by land- carriage, and I am 
defrauded with a sea Review : this is not right. 

You take politics to heart more than any man I know j I do not 



302 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEl SMITH. 

mean questions of party, but questions of national existence. I 
wish we lived in the same place, for many reasons ; but, among 
others, that we might plan some publication which would not be 
useless. These things are not to be despised, though they are not 
equal in importance to questions respecting the existence of another 
world, &c. 

I was much amused by hearing was at Lord Lauderdale's. 

I suppose a mutual treaty of peace was first signed, in which both 
surrendered part of their doctrines ; or some mutual friend, skilled 
in political economy, stepped in, — probably Horner. Brougham, 
I am sorry to hear, does not come into Parliament by this vacancy, 
occasioned by Lord Howick's elevation to the peerage. His loss 
will be grievous to the Whigs. 

Pray have the goodness to tell me, in your next letter, whether 
there is a man in Edinburgh whom you can recommend as an in- 
structor of youth, in whose house a young Englishman could be 
safely deposited, without peril of marrying a Scotch girl with a 
fortune of is. 6d. sterling. 

I humbly beseech you and earnestly exhort you to come to town 
this spring. You should revisit the metropolis more frequently 
than you do, on many accounts. 

Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — I think you have spoilt many of my jokes ; but this, I 
suppose, every writer thinks, whose works you alter; and I am 
unfortunately, as you know, the vainest and most irritable of 
human beings. 



23.] To Lady Holland. 

July 14, 1807, 
My dear Lady Holland, 
Mr Allen has mentioned to me the letters of a Mr Plymley, 
which I have obtained from the adjacent market-town, and read 
with some entertainment. My conjecture lies between three per- 
sons — Sir Samuel Romilly, Sir Arthur Pigott, or Mr Horner, for 
the name is evidently fictitious. I shall be very happy to hear 
your conjectures on this subject on Saturday, when I hope you will 
let me dine with you at Holland House, but I must sleep in town 
that night. I shall come to Holland House, unless I hear to the 
contrary, and will then answer Lord Holland's letter. 

S. S. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 303 

24.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Orchard Street, Nov. 18, 1807. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
If you have any pleasure in the gratification of your vanity, you 
may enjoy such pleasure as much as you please. You have no 
idea how high your works stand here, and what a reputation they 
have given to you. Your notions of the English Constitution 
delight the Tories beyond all belief; and you have now nearly- 
atoned for D 's opinions. The Whigs like that part of your 

review which attacks, or rather destroys, Cobbett ; but shake their 
heads at your general political doctrine. 

I am waiting to see who is to be my new master in York. * I 
care very little whether he make me reside or not, and shall take 
to grazing as quietly as Nebuchadnezzar ! 

Sydney Smith. 



25.] To Lady Holland. 

Bath, December 9, 1807. 

War, my dear Lady Holland, is natural to women, as well as men 
— at least with their own sex ! 

A dreadful controversy has broken out in Bath, whether tea is 
most effectually sweetened by lump or pounded sugar; and the 
worst passions of the human mind are called into action by the 
pulverists and the lumpists. I have been pressed by ladies on both 
sides to speak in favour of their respective theories, at the Royal 
Institution, which I have promised to do. 

In the meantime, my mind is agitated by the nicely-balanced 
force of opposite arguments, and I regret that peaceable bigotry 
which I enjoy in the metropolis, by living with men who are entirely 
agreed upon the greater part of the subjects which come under dis- 
cussion. I shall regain my own tranquillity on Saturday night, and 
bid adieu to a controversy which is more remarkable for the in- 
genious reasoning by which it is upheld, than for the important 
results to which it leads. 

The general idea here is, that we are upon the eve of reaping 
the good effects of the vigorous system of administration ; and that 
the French, driven to the borders of insanity by the want of coffee, 
will rise and establish a family more favourable to the original mode 
of breakfasting. I have ventured to express doubts, but am im- 
mediately silenced as an Edinburgh Reviewer. 

* The Archbishop, Dr Markham, was just dead. Dr Vernon, Bishop of Carlisle, 
succeeded. 



304 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

I found " the preceding phenomenon " well ; or, to speak more 
classically, everything about him referable to the sense of seeing 
excited the same ideas as before ; the same with the co-effect, or 
sister. Allen would say, the co-sequence, but he is over rigid ; in 
loose, familiar writing we may say, the co-effect ; co-sequence looks 
(as it seems to me) stiff and affected. 

Sydney Smith. 



26.] To Lady Holland. 

8 Doughty Street, Brunswick Square. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I told the little poet,* after the proper softenings of wine, dinner, 
flattery, repeating his verses, &c. &c, that a friend ot mine wished 
to lend him some money, and I begged him to take it. The poet 
said that he had a very sacred and serious notion of the duties of 
independence, that he thought he had no right to be burdensome 
to others from the mere apprehensions of evil, and that he was in 
no immediate want. If it was necessary, he would ask me here- 
after for the money without scruple ; and that the knowing he had 
such resources in reserve, was a great comfort to him. This was 
very sensible and very honourable to him, nor had he the slightest 
feeling of affront on the subject, but, on the contrary, of great grati- 
tude to his benefactor, whose name I did not mention, as the money 
was not received ; I therefore cancel your draft, and will call upon 
you, if he calls upon me. This, I presume, meets your approba- 
tion. I had a great deal of conversation with him, and he is a 
much more sensible man than I had any idea of. I have received 
this morning a very kind letter from Sir Francis Baring, almost 
amounting to a promise that I am to be a professor in his new In- 
stitution. 

I cannot conclude my letter without telling you, that you are 
a very good lady for what you have done, and that, for it, I give 
you my hearty benediction. Respectfully and sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

P. S.— I have a project for Campbell's publishing this new volume 
of poems by subscription ; they are already far advanced. 

• The late Thomas Campbell, Esq. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 305 

27.I To Lady Holland. 

York. 
• ••••••• 

You can conceive nothing like the tumult of this city ; it was as 
riotous as London in the middle of the night. I have seen two 
drunken people and one battle. The clergy and ladies are leaving 
the town. I am most happy to tell you that Lord Milton will, in 
all probability, get his election. I came here last night, and voted 
to-day. 

I forgot to send you the Chancellor's scrap. My request to him, 
through my friend Sir William Scott, was, if any patronee of his 
preferred the North to the South, that I might be allowed to gratify 
so singular a wish by exchanging with him. 

S. S. 



28.] Notes for Lord Holland. 

The Curates Bill gives such power to the Bishops, that, if to that 
be added the power they already possess by the Bill of Residence, 
no clergyman who values his domestic comfort will ever think of 
differing from his bishop's opinions in any publication, religious, 
political, or historical ; thus a great mass of educated men are 
placed in utter subservience to those who are in utter subservience 
to the Crown. 

The true remedy is, by taking care that proper people are ap- 
pointed to curacies. E.o\, let the bishops, in livings above a certain 
value, have the power of rejecting any curate who has not taken a 
degree at some English University. The difficulty of procuring 
such curates would fix the price. The condition exacted would be 
the best guarantee that the parish was well taken care of. It is 
impossible by any law to prevent me from agreeing privately with 
my curate, when I appoint him, that (let the Bishop order what he 
will) he shall only accept a certain sum. 

The law endeavours to prevent this, by saying such bargains 
shall not be binding ;-i.e., it aims to effect its object by making one 
man to act dishonourably towards another, when it is for the inter- 
est of the Church that they should both be on the best terms ; and 
this very scoundrel who has thus broken his faith is the species of 
curate which Mr Perceval contends is to be so honourable. How- 
is his condition bettered by the Bill ? If he be dishonourable, will 
he be a useful man to his parish ? 

IMPORTANT TOPICS. 

That it comes from a school that you do not like should tamper 

u 



306 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

with the Church of England ; that whenever the revenues of the 
Church arc seized upon, it will be under the very same plea upon 
which this Bill is founded -—i.e., that they belong to the State, and 
can be appropriated to any person or purpose which the State may 
think proper ; and that the step is short from ecclesiastical to lay 
tithes. 

I forgot to say, that it cannot be contended that this increase of 
salary is meant to act as a fine upon the non-resident rector; 
because you first pass a law stating that such and such causes of 
absence are legal, and then you punish a man for doing what the 
law permits. 

This law supposes that the rector is only desirous of putting in 
the cheapest curate he can get ; whereas non-resident rectors are 
commonly very desirous of putting in people of respectability. 

It is folly to speak of bettering the condition of the curate, as if it 
were a permanent state : it is merely a transitory state. The grub 
puts up with anything, because it means to be an aurelia. A foot- 
man is better than a curate, if to be a curate were the only object of 
any man ; but a man says, " I shall succeed to some preferment 
hereafter. That is my reward ; but, in the meantime, I shall take 
what I can get." 

Lastly, is it worth while for the Bishop of London to make altera- 
tions in the Church when the world has only sixty years to remain, 
— indeed, now only fifty-nine and a half ? 



29.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Orchard Street, Feb. 20, 1808. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

Your Catholic article of the last Review is, I perceive, printed 
separately. I am very glad of it : it is excellent, and universally 
allowed to be so. I envy you your sense, your style, and the 
good temper with which you attack prejudices that drive me 

almost to the limits of insanity. The Duke of } s agent in 

Ireland is an Orangeman ; and in spite of all the remonstrances of 
the Duke, who is too indolent or too good-natured to turn him off, 
he has acted like an Orangeman. What the Duke could not effect, 
you have done by your review ; and the man is now entirely con- 
verted to the interests of the Catholics, merely by what you have 
written upon the subject. This fact Lord Ponsonby told me yes- 
terday. 

I have read no article in this number, but Henry Stewart's 
* l Sallust/' which is not particularly well done. When I have read 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 307 

the Review I will tell you what I think, and what wiser men than 
I think, of each article. 

Of our friend Horner I do not see much. He has four distinct 
occupations, each of which may very fairly occupy the life of a man 
not deficient in activity : the Carnatic Commission, the Chancery 
Bar, Parliament, and a very numerous and select acquaintance. 
He has, as you perceive by the papers, spoken often and well, 
without however having as yet done anything decided. 

I regret sincerely that so many years have elapsed since we met. 
I hope, if you possibly can, you will contrive to come to town this 
spring : we will keep open house for you ; you shall not be 
molested with large parties. You have earned a very high reputa- 
tion here, and you may eat it out in turbot, at great people's 
houses, if you please ; though I well know you would prefer the 
quiet society of your old friends. 

Pray tell me whom you see most of, what you do with yourself, 
what spirits you are in, and every particular about yourself. 

I always think of Edinburgh with the greatest pleasure, and 
always resolve to pay it a visit every Sunday ; but want of time 
and of money have hitherto repressed my noble rage. 

Sydney Smith. 



30.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

March 13, 1808. 
My deai Jeffrey, 
I have now read the whole of the Review. I like the "Mecanique 
Celeste ;' ; Davy; Bowles; Hours of Idleness, too severe ; Sallust, 
not good ; Spence, profound but obscure ; Elizabeth, shocking and 
detestable ; Carnatic, said to be very good. 

The Review, I understand, sold in four days. Upon the whole, 
the number is not a good one; and I will trouble you to write 
something in every number, or we shall be accused of dulness and 
insignificance, 

Sydney Smith. 



31.] To Dr Reeve— (Norwich). 

Bishop's Lydiard, Taunton, August 11, 1808. 
My dear Sir, 
I thank you very kindly for your invitation, and for your recollec- 
tion of me. I sincerely wish that the little time I can get away 
from London would admit of my making such a visit : nothing 
would give me greater pleasure. You mention many inducements ; 



3oS LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

I can want no other than the pleasure of paying my respects to you 
and to Mrs Opie. 

The Bishop* is incomparable. He should touch for bigotry and 
absurdity ! He is a kind of man who would do his duty in all 
situations at every hazard : in Spain he would have headed his 
diocese against the French ; at Marseilles he would have struggled 
against the plague; in Flanders he would have been a Fdnelon. 
He does honour to the times in which he lives, and more good to 
Christianity than all the sermons of his brethren would do, if they 
were to live a thousand years. As you will probably be his 
physician when he is a very old man, bolster him up with nourishing 
meats, my dear doctor, invigorate him with medicated possets. 
Search for life in drugs and herbs, and keep him as a comely 
spectacle to the rising priesthood. You have a great charge ! 

Sydney Smith. 



32.] To Lady Holland. 

Howick, Sep. 9, 1808. 
Dear Lady Holland, 
I take the liberty to send you two brace of grouse, — curious, 
because killed by a Scotch metaphysician ; in other and better 
language, they are mere ideas, shot by other ideas, out of a pure 
intellectual notion, called a gun. 

I found a great number of philosophers in Edinburgh, in a high 
state of obscurity and metaphysics. 

Dugald Stewart is extremely alarmed by the repeated assurances 
I made that he was the author of " Plymley's Letters," — or gener- 
ally considered so to be. 

I have been staying here two days on my return, and two days 
on my journey to Edinburgh. An excellent man, Lord Grey, and 
pleasant to be seen in the bosom of his family. I approve very 
highly also of his lady. 

Ever most affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



33.] To Lady Holland. 

October 8, 1808. 

My dear Lady Holland, 

No sooner was your back turned than I took advantage of your 

absence to give up Harefield, and settle in Yorkshire. I never 

liked the Harefield scheme. Bad society, no land, no house, no 

salary, dear as London, neither in London nor out of it, not 

* Bishop Bathurst. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 309 

accessible to a native, not interesting to a stranger. But the fear 
of you before my eyes prevented me from saying so. 

My lot is now fixed and my heritage fixed, — most probably. 
But you may choose to make me a bishop, and if you do, I think I 
shall never do you discredit; for I believe it is out of the power 
of lawn and velvet, and the crisp hair of dead men fashioned into a 
wig, to make me a dishonest man ; but if you do not, I am 
perfectly content, and shall be ever grateful to the last hour of my 
life to you and to Lord Holland. 

is not returned : the Mufti in high leg about the Spaniards : 

Horner so extremely serious about the human race, that I am 
forced to compose my face half a street off before I meet him. 

Our next King of Clubs is on Saturday, where you and your 
expedition will be talked over at some length. I presume you have 
received a thundering letter from Lord Grey. 

You will see in the next Edinburgh Review two articles of mine, 
— one on the Catholics, the other on the Curates Bill, — neither of 
which, I think, you will read. 

I feel sometimes melancholy at the idea of quitting London, — ■ 
" the warm precincts of the cheerful day ; " but it is the will of 
God, and I am sure I shall gain by it wealth, knowledge, and 
happiness. 

Sydney Smith. 



34.] To Lady Holland. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I have heard nothing yet of the doubts and scruples of the Arch- 
bishop, and hope they may be dying away. 

I have let my house at Thames Ditton very well, and sold the 
gentleman my wine and poultry. I attribute my success in these 
matters to having read half a volume of Adam Smith early in the 
summer, and to hints that have dropped from Horner, in his play- 
ful moods, upon the subject of sale and barter. 

There is a very snug little dinner to-day at Brompton, of Aber- 
crombie, Whishaw, Bigg, and a few select valuables. It is not 
known for certain what they will talk about, but conjectured that 
it will go hard with the Spanish patriots in their conversation. By 
the by, a person with a feather and a green jacket, clearly a 
foreigner, rode express up Pall Mall yesterday evening ; and a 
post-chaise and four passed over Westminster Bridge about twelve 
o'clock to-day. I mention this for our friend Brougham ; he must 
make of it what he can. Slight appearances are to be looked to. 



3io LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

Excuse my nonsense ; you are pretly well accustomed to it by 
this time. 

Sydney Smith. 



35.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Dear Allen, 

I am glad to find that I am mistaken respecting the King of 
Clubs. Of Lord Holland or you I never had any doubt, nor of 
Romilly, but of all the others I had ; that is, I thought they were 
of opinion that the benefit of Lords Grenville, Grey, &c, should 
not be lost to the country for that single question. 

I have sent my sermon to Lord Grenville. 

It is not that the politics of the day are considered unsuitable to 
the Edinburgh Review, but the personalities of the day are objected 
to. This seems to have influenced Jeffrey. I thought it right, 
once for all, to make a profession of my faith : and by that, to 
exempt myself ever after from the necessity of noticing such 
attacks as have been made upon me in the Quarterly Review. I 
meant to do it bluntly and shortly ; if I have done it with levity, I 
am a clumsy and an unlucky fellow. 

I by no means give up my opinions respecting the Catholic 
bishops. I have added something to that note, in order to explain 
it ; but if the electors, warned of the incivism of their candidate, 
still procure his election, and put him in a situation where he is 
dependent on the will, and subject to the influence, of a foreign 
power, the Government has a right, upon every principle of self- 
preservation, to act with that man as I propose. You may object 
to the objectors, but nobody else can be entrusted with such a 
power. 

My brethren, who tremble at my boldness, should be more 
attentive to what I really said, which concerns not the truth or 
falsehood of the passage, but the expediency or inexpediency of 
allowing it to be an interpolation. 

Brougham has been extremely friendly to me about my sermon. 

Sydney Smith. 



36.3 To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

October 30, 1808. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I hear with great sorrow from Elmsley, that a very anti-Chris- 
tian article has crept into the last number of the Edinburgh 
Review, inaccurate in point of history, and dull in point of execu- 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 311 

tion. I need no other proof that the Review was left in other 
hands than yours, because you must be thoroughly aware that the 
rumour of infidelity decides not only the reputation, but the exist- 
ence of the Review. I am extremely sorry, too, on my own 
account ; because those who wish it to have been written by me, 
will say it was so. 

I hear there has been a meeting between you and your patient 
Southey, and that he was tolerably civil to his chirurgeon. 

Do not disappoint us of your company in the spring, in this 
great city, and bring with you Timotheus, accustomed to midnight 
carousal and soul-inspiring alcohol. Brown is like the laws of the 
Medes and Persians, he changeth not : a greater proneness to 
mutability would, however, have been a much better thing for 
them both ; for I have no doubt but that the laws often have been, 
and that the Doctor often is, hugely mistaken. 

Magnitude to you, my clear Jeffrey, must be such an intoxicating 
idea, that I- have no doubt you would rather be gigantic in your 
errors, than immense in no respect whatsoever ; however, comfort 
yourself that your good qualities are far beyond the common size ; 
for which reason, originally, but now from long habit, I am your 
affectionate friend, 

S. Smith. 



37.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Orchard Street, 1808. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I have as yet read very few articles in the Edinburgh Review, 
having lent it to a sick countess, who only wished to read it, 
because a few copies only had arrived in London. 

I like very much the review of Davy, think the review of 
Espriella much too severe, and am extremely vexed by the review 
of Hoyle's Exodus. The levities it contains will, I am sure, give 
very great offence ; and they are ponderous and vulgar, as well as 
indiscreet. Such sort of things destroy all the good effect which 
the liberality and knowledge of the Edinburgh Review are calcu- 
lated to produce, and give to fools as great a power over you as 
you have over them. Besides the general regret I feel from errors 
of this nature, I cannot help feeling that they press harder upon 
me than upon anybody ; by giving to the Review a character which 
makes it perilous to a clergyman, in particular, to be concerned in 
it. I am sure you will excuse me for expressing my feelings upon 
this subject, and I know that you have friendship enough for me, 
to be more upon your guard in future against a style of writing 
which is not only mischievous to me in particular, but mischievous 



312 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

to the whole undertaking ; and without the slightest compensation 
of present amusement. The author I know ; and when he told me 
the article upon which he had been employed, I foresaw the man- 
ner in which he would treat it. Upon this subject Brougham 
entirely agrees with me. 

I am glad you like the Methodists. Of the Scotch market you 
are a better judge than I am, but you may depend upon it, it will 
give great satisfaction here ; I mean, of course, the nature of the 
attack, not the manner in which it is executed. All attacks upon 
the Methodists are very popular with steady men of very moderate 
understanding ; the description of men among whom the bitteresl 
enemies of the Edinburgh Review are to be found. 

I do not understand what you mean by " levity of quotations." 
I attack these men because they have foolish notions of religion. 
The more absurd the passage, the more necessary it should be dis- 
played — the more urgent the reason for making the attack at all. 

I am thinking of writing a sheet this time about the missions to 
India and elsewhere ; in short, a sort of expose of the present state 
of Protestant missions. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



38.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

York, Nov. 20, 1808. 
My dear Jeffrey. 

It is a very long time since I answered your letter, but I have 
been choked by the cares of the world. I came down here for a 
couple of days, to look at two places which were to be let, and. have 
been detained here in pursuit of them for ten or twelve days. The 
place I am aiming at is one mile and a half from York ; a con* 
venient house and garden, with twelve acres of land. This will do 
for me very well while I am building at Foston, where I shall, in 
all human probability, spend the rest of my days. I am by no 
means grieved at quitting London ; sorry to lose the society of my 
friends, but wishing for more quiet, more leisure, less expense, and 
more space for my children. I am extremely pleased with what 
I have seen of York 

About the University of Oxford, I doubt ; but you shall have it, 
if I can possibly find time for it. I am publishing fifty sermons 
at present, which take up some considerable share of my attention : 
much more, I fear, than they will of any other person. 

I am very glad that the chances of life have brought us two 
hundred miles nearer together. It is really a fortunate circum- 
stance, that, in quitting London, where I have pushed so many 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 313 

roots, I should be brought again within the reach of the bed from 
which I was transplanted. 

I return to town next Friday, and leave it for good on Lady-day. 
Mrs Sydney is delighted with her rustication. She has suffered all 
Ihe evils of London, and enjoyed none of its goods. 

Yours, dear Jeffrey, ever most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



39.] To the Earl Grey. 

December 15, 1808. 
Dear Lord Grey, 

I had a letter from Allen, and another from Lady Holland, dated 
Corunna, 1st of December. They talk of going to Lisbon or Cadiz by 
sea, and I rather think they will do so. Allen complains of the great 
remissness of the Junta, and it is now the fashion to say here, that 
there is really no enthusiasm ; and that there never have been 
more, at any time, than seventy thousand Spanish troops on foot. 

Many people are now quite certain Buonaparte is an instru- 
ment, &c. It turns out, however, that the instrument has been 
baking biscuit very diligently at Bayonne for three months past, 
and therefore does not disdain the assistance of human means. 
We (who probably are not instruments) act as if we were. We send 
horses that cannot draw, commissaries who cannot feed an army, 
generals who cannot command one. We take our enemy out of a 
place where he can do us no harm, and land him safely in the very 
spot where he can do us the greatest mischief. We are quite con- 
vinced that Providence has resolved upon our destruction, because 
Lord Mulgrave and Lord Castlereagh have neither sense nor 
activity enough to secure our safety. 

I beg my best respects to Lady Grey, and remain, my dear Lord 
Grey, 

Your obliged and obedient servant, 

Sydney Smith. 



40.] To the Earl Grey. 

18 Orchard St?'eet, Portman Square, 
December 21, 1808. 
Dear Lord Grey, 
Dr Vaughan's brother is just come over, who says the Spaniards 
are quite sure of succeeding, and that it is impossible to conquer 
them. I mean to have him examined next week by Whishaw, 
Brougham, and other Whigs. 

Brougham and I are goin^r next week to stay a day or two with 



3 H LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

a Mr Richard Brinsley Sheridan, where we are to meet your friend 
Mrs Wilmot, whom I am very curious to see. 

I am just publishing fifty discourses, which I shall take the 
liberty to send to Lady Grey ; conceiving that in so remote a part 
of England, theology is not to be had so pure as here. 

Sydney Smith. 



41.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Orchard Street, 1808. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

When you talk of the clamours of Edinburgh, I will not remind 
you of a tempest in a pot, for that would be to do injustice to 
the metropolis of the north ; but a hurricane in a horse-pond is a 
simile useful for conveying my meaning, and not unjust to the 

venerable city of Edinburgh. 's review is imprudent in the 

expressions — more than wrong in its doctrines ; but you will not 
die of it this time, and are, I believe, more frightened than hurt. 
As for me, I am very busy, and question much whether I shall be 
able to contribute ; if I do, it will most probably be the Society for 
the Suppression of Vice. 

It is perfectly fair that any other sect of men should set up a 
Review, and, in my opinion, very immaterial. 

In all probability it is all over with Spain, and if so, probably 
there is an end of Europe ; the rest will be a downhill struggle : I 
cannot help it, and so will be merry to the last. Allen writes word 
that the Junta has been very remiss, and more, that there is no 
enthusiasm at all ; in addition, it is now said that there never have 
been more than seventy thousand men in arms. 

Yours, my dear Jeffrey, in great haste, and very sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 



42.] To Lady Holland. 

Londo?i, December, 1808. 

Why, dear Lady Holland, do you not come home ? It has been 
all over this month. Except in the Holland family there has not 
been a man of sense for some weeks who has thought otherwise. 
Are you fond of funerals ? Do you love to follow a nation to its 
grave ? What else can you see or do by remaining abroad ? Linen- 
drapers and shoemakers might perhaps save Spain, — in the hands . 
of dukes and bishops it is infallibly gone. 

Our friend has been bolting out of the course again in the 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 315 

Edinburgh Review. It is extremely difficult to keep him right. 
He should always have two tame elephants, Abercrombie and 
Whishaw, who might beat him with their trunks, when he behaved 
in an unwhiglike manner. 

I have bought a book about drilling beans, and a greyhound 
puppy for the Malton meeting. It is thought I shall be an eminent 
rural character. Do not listen to anything that is written to you 
about a change of administration. There may be a change from 
one Tory to another, but there is not the slightest chance for the 
Whigs. 

The very worst possible accounts from Ireland. I shall be 
astonished if they do not begin to make some stir. They will not 
rebel just now, but they will threaten. 

We are expecting every day the destruction of the English army 
by Buonaparte. You may hear that Lord Melville is in opposition 
upon the question of Spain, and that he entirely agrees with Lord 
Grenville upon that point. This is not understood. 

I have assisted at a great many dinners during this Christmas, 
and have been staying with Sheridan at his house in the country. 

Kindest regards to Lord Holland and Allen. 

Sydney Smith. 



43.] To Lady Holland. 

January 10, 1809. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

Many thanks for two fine Gallicia hams ; but as for boiling them 
in iviue, I am not as yet high enough in the Church for that ; so 
they must do the best they can in water. 

You have no idea of the consternation which Brougham's attack 
upon the titled orders has produced : the Review not only discon- 
tinued by many, but returned to the bookseller from the very first 
volume : the library shelves fumigated, &c. ! 

The new Review of Ellis and Canning is advertised, and begins 
next month. 

We have admitted a Mr Baring, importer and writer, into the 
King of Clubs, upon the express condition that he lends ,£50 to 
any member of the Club when applied to. I proposed the amend- 
ment to his introduction, which was agreed to without a dissenting 
voice. 

You know Mr Luttrell is prisoner in Fez. Mufti has been ill, 
but the rumour of a Tory detected in a job has restored him. 
Horner is ill. He was desired to read amusing books : upon 
searching his library it appeared he had no amusing books, — the 



3i6 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

nearest of any work of that description being The Indian Trader's 
Complete Guide ! 

I cannot tell you how much I miss you and Lord Holland; for 
besides the pleasure I have in your company, I have contracted a 
real regard and affection for you, wish you to get on prosperously 
and wisely, — want other people to like you, and should be afflicted 
if any real harm happened to you and yours. 

Sydney Smith. 



44.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Orchard Street, Feb. 20, 1 809. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

Nothing can be better written than Burns. The Bishop's 
Spanish America opens badly. We shall talk over this subject 
much better than we can write upon it. 

I by no means say I will not go on with the Edinbgurh Review, 
— by no means say that I will not contribute more copiously, and 
articles of better stamp, than I yet have done ; but whether I will 
do so or not, will depend upon the result of our conference. Meet 
we must, as I shall be either where you are coming to, or where 
you will pass through ; in which of these two places, I do not 
know. My first object is to sell my house : if I do it before Lady- 
day, I will quit London at that period. It is very improbable, 
however, that I shall do so now ; and I guess that I shall stay in 
London till the birthday. 

I beg you very seriously to take a little pains with your hand- 
writing : if you will be resolute about it for a month, you will im- 
prove immensely : at present your writing is, literally speaking, 
illegible, and I have not now read one-half of your letter. You 
talked of reviewing my sermons, now published : I should be 
obliged to you to lay aside the idea ; I know very well my sermons 
are quite insignificant. 

Spain is quite gone. In all probability the English army will 
be entirely destroyed ; and though the struggle will be long, the 
greater chance surely is that this country will at length be involved 
in the general ruin. 

Sydney Smith. 



45.] To John Allen, Esq. 

February 21, 1809. 
Dear Allen, 
1 have received from you two or three very kind letters, for 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY, SMITH. 317 

which I thank you ; and should have done so before, had I not 
taken a gay turn lately, and meddled much in the amusements of 
the town. 

I am glad to find that it has pleased Providence to restore you to 
your reason, and that your are coming home. You may depend 
upon it, there is no country like this for beauty and steadiness of 
climate, as well as for agremens of manners ; we are a gay people, 
living under a serene heaven. 

I have had thoughts of writing a political pamphlet, but have 
adjourned it to another year. From time to time I will make a 
resolute and lively charge upon the enemy. 

The Edinburgh Review for February is come. It is the best, I 
think, that has appeared for a long time ; " Burns and Warburton/' 
by Jeffrey ; " Code de la Conscription," by Walsh, Secretary to 
the American Ambassador ; " Spanish America," by a Mr Mill ;* 
" Society for the Suppression of Vice," by a Mr Sydney Smith ; 
"West Indies," by Brougham; "Steam Engine," by Playfair ; 
" Sanscrit Grammar," by Hamilton ; " Copenhagen," I believe, 
ditto. The Quarterly Review is out also ; not good, I hear. 

The division upon the Orders in Council has surprised every- 
body, and St Stephen told Brougham he thought it decisive of their 
repeal. Three bishops voted with Lord Grenville. Something of 
this division may be attributed to Mrs Clarke and the Duke. The 
conversation of the town for the last fortnight has, as you may 
suppose, been extremely improper. I have endeavoured as much 
as I can to give it a little tinge of propriety, but without effect. I 
think the Duke of York must fall. Believe me, my dear Allen, 
ever yours most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



46.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

March 7, 1809. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I will review, if you please, "Ccelebs in Search of a Wife," and 
must beg the favour of an early answer to know if it is at my dis- 
posal. I may, perhaps, review something else ; but at present I 
know of nothing. Suggest something to me. 

Would you like a review of Fenelon by Mr Butler,f Of Lincoln's 
Inn? Has a Mr Blomfield,J of Trinity College, Cambridge, 

* James Mill, Esq., author of " British India." Mr Mill was intimately acquainted 
with General Miranda, from whom he doubtless derived much information about Spanish 
America.— Ed. • 

t Charles Butler, Esq., the celebrated Real Property Lawyer. 

J The present Bishop of London. 



318 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

offered you any classical articles ? Do you want any ? and will 
you accept any from Dr Maltby?* I think I will review Cock- 
burn's attack upon the Edinburgh Review — why not? What do 
you think of the Quarterly? I have written twice to John Murray, 
to beg the favour of him to make some inquiries for me. Will you 
have the goodness to find out whether my letters have been re- 
ceived, and whether it is inconvenient to him to do what I have 
asked him to do ? Pray answer these queries punctually, and by 
return, because time presses for the next number. 

Mrs S. begs to be kindly remembered. It will, I am sure, give 
her great pleasure to see you again. I am extremely pleased with 
your articles, and with the Code of Conscription. Ever your 
sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



47.] To Lady Holland. 

June 24, 1809. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

This is the third day since I arrived at the village of Heslington, 
two hundred miles from London. I missed the hackney-coaches 
for the first three or four days in York, but after that, prepared my- 
self for the change from the aurelia to the grub state, and dare say 
I shall become fat, torpid, and motionless with a very good grace. 

I have laid down two rules for the country : first, not to smite 
the partridge ; for if I fed the poor, and comforted the sick, and in- 
structed the ignorant, yet I should be nothing worth, if I smote the 
partridge. If anything ever endangers the Church, it will be the 
strong propensity to shooting for which the clergy are remarkable. 
Ten thousand good shots dispersed over the country do more harm 
to the cause of religion than the arguments of Voltaire and Rous- 
seau. The squire never reads, but is it possible he can believe that 
religion to be genuine whose ministers destroy his game? 

I mean to come to town once a year, though of that, I suppose, I 
shall soon be weary, finding my mind growing weaker and weaker, 
and my acquaintance gradually falling off. I shall by that time 
have taken myself again to shy tricks, pull about my watch-chain, 
and become (as I was before) your abomination. 

I am very much obliged to Allen for a long and very sensible 
letter upon the subject of Spain. After all, surely the fate of Spain 
depends upon the fate of Austria. Pray tell the said Don Juan, 
if he comes northward to visit the authors .of his existence, he must 
make this his resting-place. 

* The present Bishop of Durham. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 319 

Mrs Sydney is all rural bustle, impatient for the parturition of 
hens and pigs ; I wait patiently, knowing all will come in due 

season ! 

Sydney Smith. 



48.] To Lady Holland. 

No dale 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I hope you are quite well, dining with, and giving dinners to, 
agreeable people : free from all bores, and not displeased with your- 
self. 

I am told Mr Allen is quite miserable at being defeated by the 
Archbishop. The trial of skill was remarkable, and it is now quite 
clear that the atoms have no real power and influence in this 
world. 

My life for the summer is thus disposed of: — I walk up and 
down my garden, and dine at home, till August ; then come my 
large brother and my little sister ; then I go to Manchester, to stay 
with Philosopher Philips, in September ; Horner and Murray come 
to see me in October ; then I shall go and see the Earl Grey ; then 
walk up and down my garden till March. 

Sydney Smith. 



49-] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Heslington, Sep. 3, 1809. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
Are we to see you?— (a difficult thing at all times todo). Have 
you settled your dispute with Constable, and in what manner ? It 
is almost superfluous to praise what you write, for you write every- 
thing in a superior manner ; the rule therefore is, that you are to 
be highly praised, and the blame is the exception. I admire your 
temper ; it is a difficult thing to refute so many follies, and to re- 
buke so many villanies, and still to keep yourself within bounds ; 
you have the merit of doing this in an eminent degree, and have 
exemplified your talent in the review of R . You speak, I can- 
not help thinking, rather too carelessly of economy in your M Parlia- 
mentary Reform ; " in the present war, threatening a duration of 
thirty years, everything will turn upon it. I object rather to your 
tone than to any of your opinions ; nor is it only that economy will 
decide the contest, but that English habits, and prejudices, and 
practices are not favourable to this humble political virtue. I must 

be pardoned for suspecting the praise of to be overdone, and 

for pronouncing the review of Lord , to be neither short nor 



320 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

highly entertaining, nor wholly free from that species of political 
animadversion which is resorted to in the daily papers. The re- 
view of Davy I like very much. 

The European world is, I think, here at an end ; there is surely 
no card left to play. 

Instead of being unamused by trifles, I am, as I well knew I 
should be, amused by them a great deal too much ; I feel an un- 
governable interest about my horses or my pigs, or my plants ; I 
am forced, and always was forced, to task myself up into an in- 
terest for any higher objects. When, I ask, shall we see you ? I 
claim, by that interrogation, an answer to a letter of special invita- 
tion, written to you from Philips's, and which I cordially renew, 
and would aggravate, if I could, every syllable of invitation it con- 
tained. Pray lay an injunction upon Tim Thompson, that he in 
nowise journey to or from the metropolis without tarrying here. 

Though you are absent, jokes shall never fail ; 
I '11 kill the fatted calf, and tap the foaming ale ; 
We '11 settle men and things by rule of thumb, 
And break the lingering night with ancient rum. 

Sydney Smith. 



50.] To Lady Holland. 

London, Sept. 9, 1809. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
I hear you laugh at me for being happy in the country, and 
upon this I have a few words to say. In the first place, whether 
one lives or dies, I hold, and have always held, to be of infinitely 
less moment than is generally supposed ; but if life is to be, then 
it is common sense to amuse yourself with the best you can find 
where you happen to be placed. I am not leading precisely the 
life I should choose, but that which (all things considered, as well 
as I could consider them) appeared to me to be the most eligible. 
I am resolved, therefore, to like it, and to reconcile myself to it ; 
which is more manly than to feign myself above it, and to send up 
complaints by the post, of being thrown away, and being desolate, 
and such like trash. I am prepared, therefore, either way. If the 
chances of life ever enable me to emerge, I will show you that I 
have not been wholly occupied by small and sordid pursuits. If 
(as the greater probability is) I am come to the end of my career, 
I give myself quietly up to horticulture, &c. In short, if it be my 
lot to crawl, I will crawl contentedly ; if to fly, I will fly with alac- 
rity ; but, as long as I can possibly avoid it, I will never be un- 
happy. If, with a pleasant wife, three children, a good house and 
farm, many books, and many friends, who wish me well, I cannot 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 321 

be happy, I am a very silly, foolish fellow, and what becomes of 
me is of very little consequence. I have at least this chance of 
doing well in Yorkshire, that I am heartily tired of London. 

I beg pardon for saying so much of myself, but I say it upon this 
subject once for all. 

We had a meeting of our Club last Saturday, and a very agree- 
able one, where your journey to Spain was criticised at much 
length. Some inclined to this opinion, others to that, — but upon 
my mentioning that several agreeable dinners at Holland House 
were irretrievably lost, there was a perfect unanimity of opinion. 
Sharpe said, "It was a blow." 

I met in the Strand to-day. He had the two first sheets of 

his poem in his pocket, and I believe nothing else, for he told me 
he had spent all his money, and was rather put to it. 

Poor Dumont has lost his sister, and is in great affliction ; but 
he dines with me on Saturday, and I hope to raise up the pleasures 
Nos. 13 and 24. 

No news of any kind, except that this pert and silly answer of 
Canning's to the citizens has made a considerable impression in 
the City. Some say that Lord Hawksbury attempted this piece of 
pertness in imitation of Canning. 

I have read the Review, and like the review of Rose exceedingly. 
How can any one dislike it ? Parliamentary Reform exceedingly 
good, with some objections ; Miss Edgeworth over-praised ; Strabo, 
by Payne Knight, excellent ; the Bakerian Lectures very good ; 
Lord Sheffield dull and hot. I am glad you liked Parr. 

I am about to open the subject of classical learning in the 
Review, from which, by some accident or other, it has hitherto 
abstained. It will give great offence, and therefore be more fit for 
this journal, the genius of which seems to consist in stroking the 
animal the contrary way to that which the hair lies. 

I dare say it cost you much to part with Charles : but in the pre- 
sent state of the world, it is better to bring up our young ones to 
war than to peace. I burn gunpowder every day under the nostrils 
of my little boy, and talk to him often of fighting, to put him out of 
conceit with civil sciences, and prepare him for the evil times which 
are coming ! 

Ever, respectfully and affectionately, your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



51.] To Lady Holland. 

HeslingtoHy Sept. 20, 1809. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I shall be extremely happy to see , and will leave a note for 

x 



322 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

him at the tavern where the mail stops, to say so. Nothing can 
exceed the dulness of this place : but he has been accustomed to 
live alone with his grandmother, which, though a highly moral 
life, is not an amusing one. 

There are two Scotch ladies staying here, with whom he will get 
acquainted, and to whom he may safely make love the ensuing 
winter : for love, though a very acute disorder in Andalucia, puts 
on a very chronic shape in these northern latitudes ; for, first, the 
lover must prove metafiheezically that he ought to succeed ; and 
then, in the fifth or sixth year of courtship (or rather of argument), 
if the summer is tolerably warm, and oatmeal plenty, the fair one 
is won. 

Sydney Smith. 



52.] From Lord Holland to the Rev. Sydney Smith. 

Dear Sydney, 
Pray exert yourself with such friends as your heterodox opinions 
on Longs and Shorts have left you in Oxford, in favour of Lord 
Grenville for the Chancellorship. I am sure you would do it con 
amore if you had heard our conversation at Dropmore the other day, 
and the warm and enthusiastic way in which he spoke of Peter 
Plymley. I did not fail to remind him that the only author to whom 
we both thought he could be compared in English, lost a bishopric 
for his wittiest performance ; and I hoped that if we could discover 
the author, and had ever a bishopric in our gift, we should prove 
that Whigs were both more grateful and more liberal than Tories. 
He rallied me upon my affectation of concealing who it was, but 
added that he hoped Peter would not always live in Yorkshire, 
where he was persuaded he was at present ; for, among other 
reasons, we felt the want of him just now in the state of the press, 
and that he heartily wished Abraham would do something to pro- 
voke him to take up his pen. But I must write some more letters 
to Oxford people. — Yours ever, 

Vassal Holland. 



53 5 ] To the Earl Grey. 

October 3,1809. 
Dear Lord Grey, 
I have been meditating a visit to Howick Castle, and was meditat- 
ing it before Lord Castlereagh shot Mr Canning in the thigh, which 
will make you Secretary of State. If they do not choose to sur- 
render, and attempt to patch up an Administration, then you will 
remain in the country ; and I purpose to stay with you a few days, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 323 

if you will accept my company, towards the end of the month. I 
suspect, however, before that period you will be evacuating Wal- 
cheren, contracting for bark and port-wine, selling off the trans- 
ports, and putting an end to that system of vigour which when dis- 
played by individuals instead of nations, is usually mitigated by a 
strait waistcoat and low diet. 

There is no man who thinks better of what you and your coad- 
jutors can and will do : but I cannot help looking upon it as a most 
melancholy proof of the miserable state of this country, when men 
of integrity and ability are employed. If it were possible to have 
gone on without them, I am sure they would never have been thought 
of. Yours ever most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



54.] To Lord Holland. 

Hoivick,Nov. 1, 1809. 
My dear Lord Holland, 

I would have answered your kind note sooner, but that it followed 
me here, after being detained for a day or two at York. 

Whatever little interest or connection I may have shall be ex- 
erted in favour of Lord Grenville, to whom I sincerely wish 
success. 

It will be doing a good action, I conjecture, if his lordship ever 
brings Peter Plymley out of Yorkshire ; because, though the said 
Peter does not by any means dislike living in the country, he 
would, as I understand, prefer that the country in which he does 
live were nearer his old friends. I should not be in the least sur- 
prised if this grave writer, in some shape or another, made his 
appearance next spring, if the then state of affairs should enable 
him to write with effect and utility. 

The noble Earl here is in perfect health, and so are all his family. 
I have been spending a fortnight with him, and think him in appear- 
ance quite another person from what he was last year. 

I have a project of publishing in the spring a pamphlet, which I 
think of calling " Common Sense for 1810 ;" for which I will lay 
down some good doctrines, and say some things which I have in 
my head, and which I am sure it will be very useful to say. If I 
do, I will write it here, and improve it when I obtain further infor- 
mation from you in town. But what use is there in all this, or in 
anything else ? Omnes ibimus ad Diabolum, et Buonaparte nos 
conquerabit, et dabit Hollandiam Domum ad unum corporalium 
suorum, et ponet ad mortem Joannem Allenium. 

Yours ever most truly, 

Sydney Smith, 



32 1 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

55.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

November 4, 1809. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I have just returned from Lord Grey's and have only leisure to 
reply to the business part of your letter. You may write to Payne 
Knight without scruple, and using your old illustration of Czar 
Peter, you may mention money j or rather leave that to me, and I 
will write to him about it. I hope you will not be affronted if I 
seriously advise you to dictate a letter to him. Your motto is, 
Mens sine manu. 

Blomfield is an admirable scholar. Publish his review, and 
Payne Knight will write you something else ; but this is just as you 
please ; I have no wish really upon the subject. I will write soon 
at length. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



56.] To John Allen, Esq. 

York, Nov. 22, 1809. 
Dear Allen, 

I am much obliged to you for your book, to which I see but one 
objection, and that is, that there will be an end of Spain before the 
Cortes can be summoned, or the slightest of your provisions carried 
into execution, — admirable rules for diet to a patient in the article 
of death. I shall read it however, as a Utopia from your romantic 
brain. 

I beg my congratulations to the Lord and Lady of the Castle on 
the event which your postcript announces to me for the first time. 
Let the child learn principles from Dumont, Sharpe shall teach him 
ease and nature, Lauderdale wit, my own Pybus shall inspire his 
muse, and shall show him the way to heaven. 

As for the Opposition, if they give up the Catholics, I think their 
character is ruined. Ireland is much endangered, and the King 
will kick them out again after he has degraded them. A politician 
should be as flexible in little things as he is inflexible in great. 
The probable postponement of such a measure in such times for 
ten years, — how is it possible for any honest public man to take 
office at such a price ? I have no doubt that the country would 
rather submit to Massena than to Whitbread. If the King were 
to give the Opposition carte blanche to-morrow, I cannot see that 
they could form an administration in the House of Commons. I 
have not promised, as you say, to write a pamphlet called Common 
Sense, in the spring ; it is of very little or no consequence whether 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 325 

I do write it or not, but I have by no means made up my mind to 
do it. 

We have a report here that the measles and whooping-cough 
have got amongst the New Administration ; it is quite foolish to 
make such young people ministers. 

Yours most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 

P.S.—l will send you in return for your pamphlet a sermon 
against horse-racing and coursing, judiciously preached before the 
Archbishop and the sporting clergy of Maltor, 



57.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

November 29, 1809. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I have not yet written to Payne Knight, nor do I think any man 
but yourself has sufficient delicacy and felicity of expression to 
offer a man of ten thousand a year a few guineas for a literary 
jeit d" esprit; I think, therefore, I must turn it over to you, with 
many apologies for the delay occasioned by the mis-estimation of 
my own powers. 

I should like to review a little pamphlet upon Public Schools, 
Pinkey's " Travels in the South of France," and Canning's Letter, 
if published in a separate pamphlet, as I believe it is. 

I have just published a sermon, which I will send you, — very 
commonplace, like all the others, but honest, and published for a 
particular reason. 

The question in politics is, if the Catholics will be given up ? 
That the whole business will be brought to that issue I do not 
doubt ; — that everything (in spite of Lord Wellesley's acceptance) 
will be offered to the late Administration, if they will give up the 
gentlemen of the crucifix. 

Nine bishops vote for Lord Grenville at the Oxford election ! 
and the Archbishop of York has written and circulated a high 
panegyric upon his (Lord G.'s) good dispositions towards the 
Church ; I mean, circulated it in letters to his correspondents. 
Ever, my dear Jeffrey, your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



326 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

58.] To Lady Holland. 

Heslingtotiy Dec. 8, 1809. 
Dear Lady Holland, 

I have been long intending to write you a letter of congratulation. 
There is more happiness in a multitude of children than safety in a 
multitude of counsellors ; and if I were a rich man, I should like to 
have twenty children. 

It seems to me that Canning would come in again under Lord 
Wellesley, and the whole of this eruption would end with making a 
stronger Ministry than before. 

My wishes for Lord Grenville's success are, I confess, not very 
fervent : it would be exceedingly agreeable, considered as a victory 
gained over the Court, but it would connect Lord Grenville per- 
sonally with high Tories and Churchmen, and operate as a very 
serious check to the liberal views which he now entertains ; and as 
I consider Lord Grenville as a Magdalene in politics, I always 
suspect there may be a hankering after his old courses, and wish 
therefore to keep him as much as possible out of bad company. 
The Archbishop of these parts not only votes for him, but writes 
flaming panegyrics upon him, which he has read to me. There are 
eight other bishops who vote for him. It seems quite unnatural, — 
like a murrain among the cattle. 

I hear you have a good tutor for Henry, which I am exceedingly 
glad of. Lord Grey has met with no tutor as yet ; tutors do not 
like to go beyond Adrian's Wall. You are aware that it is neces- 
sary to fumigate Scotch tutors : they are excellent men, but require 
this little preliminary caution. They are apt also to break the 
church windows, and get behind a hedge and fling stones at the 
clergyman of the parish, and betray other little symptoms of irre- 
ligion ; but these you must not mind. Send me word if he has any 
tricks of this kind. I have seen droves of them, and know how to 
manage them. Very sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith, 



59.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Heslington, December, 1809. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
Will you be so good as to send me the names of the original con- 
tributors to the Review ? 

I have scarcely any belief in a change of Administration if they 
get Canning; if they do not, they are surely as blamable as a man 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 327 

who, intending to go a journey with great expedition, does not hire 
a chaise-and-four. 

I like Playfair's review, though I comprehend it not ; but, as a 
Dutchman might say, who heard Erskine or you speak at the bar, 
" I am sure I should be pleased with that man's eloquence, if I could 
comprehend a word he said." So I give credit to Playfair for the 
utmost perspicuity and the most profound information, though I 
understand not what he says, nor am at all able to take any mea- 
sure of its importance. 

God bless you, my dear Jeffrey ! Your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



60.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Heslington, Dec. 18, 1809. 
My dear Allen, 

Whoever wants a job done goes to : whoever wants sense 

and information on any subject applies to you. 

Do you think Canning's pamphlet a fit subject for the Review ? 
Does it appear to you, as it does to me, a very inefficient and 
unsatisfactory answer? Don't you think, even from his own 
account, that he used Castlereagh ill in endeavouring for the first 
two months to ascertain whether or not he was informed of his 
(Canning's) objections ? Did he not behave very ill to the country 
in remaining so long a time in office with this (as he thought) bad 
minister ? and in suffering him to retain the management of such 
an expedition ? Do you not think that Lord Wellesley was waiting 
the result of this intrigue ? I shall be very much obliged to you to 
give me your opinion on these points as soon as you can, that I 
may (if it shall appear expedient after the receipt of your letter) 
prepare a proper mixture for my friend. 

Yours, dear Allen, most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



61.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Heslington, Dec. 28, 1809. 
Dear Allen, 
I fear you will think me capricious, but in the interval between 
my letter and yours, I received a letter from Jeffrey, strongly 
pressing me to give up the idea of reviewing the pamphlet, as 
derogatory to the Review ; coming after a letter from Abercrombie, 
in answer to one of mine, strongly to the same purpose. To the 
union of such authority, and the arguments with which they sup- 



328 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

ported it, I gave up, and not hearing from you, finally relinquished 
the idea, which now to resume would appear light and inconsid- 
erate. 

I have received four or five letters from some of our friends 
respecting my sermon ; not a word about perseverance in the 
Catholic question : I see plainly the Protestant religion is gaining 
ground in the King of Clubs. 

I have sent my sermon to John the Silent, and should be obliged 
to him for the living of St Paul's, Covent Garden, in return. Scire 
potestates herbarum usumque — I should take for my motto. 

I have had a long letter from Brougham upon the subject of my 
sermon. Do you not think his conduct of the war admirable ? I 
would not for the earth tell you the complimentary simile I have 
made to him upon it. Ever yours, dear Allen, very faithfully, 

Sydney Smith. 



62.] To Lady Holland. 

No dale: about 1809. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I have no doubt of Lord Morpeth's good disposition towards me, 
but he is afraid of introducing such a loquacious personage to his 
decorous parent. This however is veiy fair ; and I hope my chil- 
dren will have the opposite dread, of introducing very silent people 
to me in my old age. 

I like Lord Morpeth, — a man of excellent understanding, very 
polished manners, and a good heart. 

I take it this letter will follow you to Burgos, as I conclude you 
are packed up for Spain. Dumont, Bentham, and Horner sail in 
September, with laws, constitution, &c. A list of pains and 
pleasures, ticketed and numbered, already sent over ; with a 
smaller ditto of emotions and palpitations. 

I mean to make some maxims, like Rochefoucauld, and to 
preserve them. My first is this : — After having lived half their 
lives respectable, many men get tired of honesty, and many women 
of propriety. 

Yours very affectionately, 

Sydney Smith, 



63.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Heslington, Jan. 7, 1810, 
Dear Murray, 
I have not been unmindful of your commission • but no estate of 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 329 

the atheistical or tithe-free species has occurred since you were here, 
with the exception of one, the particulars of which are travelling to 
you vid Horner. 

I believe Horner's speech to have been very sensible, and full of 
good constitutional law ; and, upon the whole, without amounting 
to any very luminous display, to have done him great credit. 
Leach is the man who has distinguished himself the most. 

Your grouse are not come by this day's mail, but I suppose they 
will come to-morrow. Even the rumour of grouse is agreeable ; 
many thanks to you for your kindness. I should certainly have 
come on to Edinburgh, but it was Christmas ; and at that season, 
you know, there are divers family dinners to be eaten. Ever, my 
dear Murray, very sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



64.] To Lady Holland. 

Ja7iuary 27, 18 10. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I always thought Lord Grenville would give up the Catholics, 
ind I think Earl Grey right about the veto. I cannot say how 
much I like the said Earl ;— a fine nature, a just and vigorous 
understanding, a sensitive disposition, and infirm health. These 
are his leading traits. His excellencies are courage, discretion, 
and practical sense ; his deficiency, a want of executive coarseness. 

Poor ! pray remind him of my existence, of my good wishes 

towards him, of our common love of laughter, and our common 
awkwardness in riding 

Many thanks to John Allen for his letter in answer to my first 
imputation, of the horrid crime of Protestantism having crept into 
the King of Clubs. He is forced, at last, to reduce himself to 
Lord Holland, to Romilly, the atrocious soul of Cato, and that 
complex bundle of ideas which is popularly called Allen. As for 
Romilly, he has no merit in not changing ; les principes are 
eternal, and totally independent of events. Benthamism is 
supposed to have existed before time and space ; and goes on by 
immutable rules, like freezing and thawing. To give up the 
Catholics, would be to confound the seventeenth pain with the 
eighteenth. 

Farewell, my dear Lady Holland ; for I should go on scribbling 
this nonsense all night, as I should talking it, if I were near you. 

Svdney Smith. 



330 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

65.] From Mrs Sydney Smith to Francis Jeffrey, Esq* 

Heslington, 18 10. 
My dear Mr Jeffrey, 

I have scarcely a moment in which to tell you, — what, by the by, 
I ought to have done a week since, and should have done, but that 
I have been too ill to write a single word that I could avoid, — that 
Sydney comes home the 17th ; and therefore, as soon as you can 
resolve to come to us, tant mieux fiour nous. It will make us both 
sincerely happy to see you, for as long a time as you can contrive 
to spare us ; and I hope you will give us the satisfaction of seeing 
you quite well. 

We have been a sad house of invalids here, but we are all cheer- 
ing up at the prospect of Sydney's return. The other day, poor 
little Douglas was lying on the sofa very unwell, while Saba and I 
were at dinner ; and I said, " Well, dear little Chuffy, I don't know 
what is the matter with us both, but we seem very good-for- 
nothing!" "Why, mamma," said Saba, "/'// tell you what the 
matter is : you are so melancholy and so dull because papa is 
away ; he is so merry, that he makes us all gay. A family doesn't 
prosper, I see, without a papa ! " I am much inclined to be of her 
opinion : and suspecting that the observation would please him 
quite as well as that of any of his London flatterers, I despatched it 
to him the next day. 

Yours very sincerely, 

Catharine Amelia Smith. 



66.] To Lady Holland. 

Heslington, April 21, 1 8 1 o. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I found all here quite well, after some illness and much despond- 
ency ; of which, if my absence were not the cause, my return has 
been the cure. 

Letters awaited me here from his Smallness Mr Jeffrey, stating 
his extreme lack of matter for the ensuing number of the Edinburgh 
Review. The time allotted is so short, that I shall have no oppor- 
tunity of introducing any of those admirable and serious papers of 
which your ladyship has so unjust an abhorrence, but in which my 
forte really consists. 

* This letter is so complete and faithful a family picture, that I have not been able to 
resist the temptation to insert it. The joyous and joy-giving father, the tender and 
devoted wife and mother, the happy children, sensible of their happiness, are all placed 
before us in these few words. — Ed. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 331 

I hope you like Holland House after dirty Pall Mall. You will 
only have a few real friends till about the 15th of May. As soon 
as the lilac begins to blossom, and the streets to get hot, even Fish 
Crawford will come. I am sure it is better for Lord Holland and 
you to be at Holland House, because you both hate exercise (as 
every person of sense does), and you must be put in situations 
where it can be easily and pleasantly taken. Even Allen gets 
some exercise at Holland House, for Horner, Sheridan, and 
Lord Lauderdale take him out on the gravel-walk, to milk him for 
bullion, Spain, America, and India ; whereas, in London, he is 
milked in that stall below-stairs. 

I hope your dinner at Rogers's was pleasant, and that it makes 
not a solitary exception to the nature and quality of his entertain- 
ments. 

I will say nothing of poor Mr Windham. Lord Holland and you 
must miss him, in every sense of the word, deeply. 

I am sorry the Opposition have taken such a strong part in 
favour of the privileges of the House, for I am sure it is the wrong 
side of the question ; and the democrats have chosen admirable 
ground to fight the other political parties upon, and will, in the end, 
defeat them. 

There is nothing, I think, good in the Edinburgh Review this 
time, but Allen's two papers on Spanish America. 

Sydney Smith. 



67.] To Lady Holland. 

June, 1 8 10. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I am truly glad that Tierney is better from those nitrous baths. 
Can so much nitrous acid get into the human frame without pro- 
ducing some moral and intellectual effect as well as physical ? If 
you watch, I think you will find changes. You have done an 
excellent deed in securing a seat for poor Mackintosh, in whose 
praise I most cordially concur. He is very great, and a very 
delightful man, and, with a few bad qualities added to his char- 
acter, would have acted a most conspicuous part in life. Yet, after 
all, he is rather academic than forensic. A professorship at Hert- 
ford is well imagined, and if he can keep clear of contusions at the 
annual peltings, all will be well. The season for lapidating the 
professors is now at hand ; keep him quiet at Holland House till 
all is over.* 

If I could envy any man for successful ill-nature, I should envy 

Lord Byron for his skill in satirical nomenclature. 

* This refers to some outbreaks of insubordination among the students at Haileybury 
College.— Ed. 



332 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Nothing can exceed the evils of this spring. All agricultural 
operations are at least a month behindhand. The earth, that 
ought to be as hard as a biscuit, is as soft as dough. We live here 
in great seclusion ; — happily and comfortably. My life is cut up 
into little patches. I am schoolmaster, farmer, doctor, parson, 
justice, &c, &c 

I hope you have read, or are reading, Mr Stewart's book, and 
are far gone in the philosophy of mind ; a science, as he repeatedly 
tells us, still in its infancy : I propose, myself, to wait till it comes 
to years of discretion. I hear Lord Holland has taken a load of 
fishing-tackle with him. This is a science which appears to me to 
be still in its infancy. 

Do not let Allen stay too long at home ; it will give him a turn 
for the domestic virtues, and spoil him. 

We are all well, and unite, my dear Lady Holland, in the kindest 
regards to you and the noble fisherman. 

Sydney Smith. 



68.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Heslington, July, 1810. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

Respecting my sermons, I most sincerely beg of you to extenuate 
nothing. Treat me exactly as I deserve. Remember only what it 
is you are reviewing, — an oration confined by custom to twenty or 
thirty minutes, before a congregation of all ranks and ages. Do 
not be afraid of abusing me, if you think abuse necessary : you will 
find I can bear it extremely well from you. 

As for the Quarterly Review, I have not read it, nor shall I, nor 
ought I — where abuse is intended, not for my correction, but my 
pain. I am however very fair game : if the oxen catch the butcher, 
they have a right to toss and gore him. 

I can only trifle in this Review. It takes me some time to think 
about serious subjects, not having my head full of arguments on 
all subjects, like a certain friend of mine, — to whom all happiness ! 

Sydney Smith. 

I get my hay in on Monday. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 333 

69.] To Lady Holland. 

Heslington, Nov. 3, 1810. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I hope you are returned quite well, and much amused, from your 
Portsmouth excursion ; for I presume you are returned, as I see 
Lord Holland has been speaking in the House of Lords. 

We had a brisk run on the road, — Horner, Murray, Jeffrey, 

Mrs , my brother Cecil. We liked Mrs . It was wrong, 

at her time of life, to be circumvented by 's diagrams ; but 

there is some excuse in the novelty of the attack, as I believe she 
is the first lady that ever fell a victim to algebra, or that was geo- 
metrically led from the paths of discretion. 

I had occasion to write to Brougham on some indifferent sub- 
ject, and stated to him (as I knew it would give him pleasure) the 
bullion glory of Horner; every ounce of him being now worth, at 
the Mint price, £3, 17s. 4d. ! Brougham expresses himself in 
raptures. 

Sydney Smith. 



70.] To the Countess Grey. 

November 29, 18 10. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

Thank you very kindly for your obliging invitation to me and 
Mrs Smith. Nothing would give Mrs Sydney more pleasure than 
to make your acquaintance, and I am sure you would not find her un- 
worthy of it ; but the care of her young family, and the certain con- 
viction, if she leaves them for a day, that they are all dead, necessarily 
confines her a good deal at home. Some lucky chance may how- 
ever enable her hereafter to pay her respects to you ; and she will, 
I am sure, avail herself of it with great pleasure. 

If you and Lord Grey (little tempted by raree-shows) can be 
tempted to see York Minster, you must allow us to do the honours. 
We are on the road. We are about equai to a second-rate inn, as 
Mrs Sydney says ; but I think, myself, we are equal to any inn on 
the North Road, except Ferry Bridge. 

The Archbishop of York not only votes for Lord Grenville, but 
has passed upon him and his ecclesiastical propensities a warm 
panegyric, which he has read to me, has sent to Oxford, and dis- 
persed everywhere. There are eight bishops who vote for him. I 
call them the Sacred Nine ! 

My discourse will be finished to-morrow, and shall be forthwith 



334 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

sent. I am obliged to you for your opinion of my orthodoxy, 
which I assure you is no more than I deserve. As for being a 
bishop, that I shall never be ; but I shall, I believe, be quite as 
happy a man as any bishop. 

I remain, dear Lady Grey, very sincerely and respectfully 
yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

P. S. — I am performing miracles in my parish with garlic for 
hooping-cough. 



71.] To Lady Holland. 

December 5, 18 10. 
My dear Lady Holland. 

I have understood that Sir James Mackintosh is about to return, 
of which I am very glad. I shall like him less than I did, when I 
thought Philowsophee to be of much greater consequence than I 
now do ; but I shall still like him very much. 

Bobus is upon the eve of his return, and I rather think we shall 
see him in the spring. 

Lord Holland is quite right to get a stock of eatable sheep ; but 
such sheep are not exclusively the product of Scotland, but of every 
half-starved, ill-cultivated country ; and are only emphatically called 
Scotch, to signify ill fed ; as one says Roman, to signify brave. 
They may be bought in Wales, in any quantity ; and every Novem- 
ber, at Helmsley, in Yorkshire : the mutton you ate at my house 
was from thence. Helmsley is two hundred and twenty miles 
from London. 

I am, my dear Lady Holland, yours sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 



72.] To the Earl Grey. 

December 29, 1810. 
My dear Lord, 

I am very much obliged to you for your kindness in sending me 
the pheasants. One of my numerous infirmities is a love of eating 
pheasants. 

I am always sorry for any evil that happens to Lady Grey, be it 
only a sick finger ; no light malady, when it prevents those who 
respect her as much as I do from receiving a letter from her. I 
shall have great pleasure in criticising the flower-garden next year, 
but still have a hankering for a little bit of green in the middle. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 335 

I wish I could write as well as Plymley ; but if I could, where is 
such a case to be found? When had any lawyer such a brief? 
The present may be a good brief, but how can it be so good ? 

To write such letters as you require, it would be necessary (sup- 
posing, as you politely suppose, that I could do the thing well 
under any circumstances) that I should be near you, and in London: 
materials furnished at such a distance from you and the press, 
would never do ; especially in a production that must be hasty, 
if it is at all. You may depend upon it, I will be as good as my 
word, and write one or two pamphlets. I shall never own them, 
and you will probably read them without knowing them to be 
mine ; but it will be contributing my mite to a good cause. It is 
foolish to boast that I intend to subscribe a mite ; it is better to do 
it, and be silent ; but I spake it between the hours of six and eight, 
and to the leader of the Whigs. 

I dare say you are right about 's declaration ; and as I never 

find you averse to reason a matter with a person so politically 
ignorant as myself, were I in Howick library, I dare say I should 
soon yield to your explanations. It appears to me that the little 
Methodist says, " There is a vacancy in the Government ; I will 
proceed to fill it up, in a manner which appears to me (and has 
before appeared to Mr Pitt) the most eligible. In the meantime, 
as there is no executive government, the public service must not 
suffer. We (not /) will perform every function of the Executive, 
and then come for a bill of indemnity. * 

Now, if his plan for a Regency is right, how is his declaration 
blamable ? Somebody must act till the vacancy is filled up ; and 
if not the Ministers, who besides ? But they have not filled up 
this vacancy in the most expeditious manner. True, — they are 
blamable ; not for acting executively in the interval, but for not 
making that interval as short as possible. 

Excuse my heresies : you know that a short argument often 
teaches me. 

Ever, my dear Lord, yours most sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 



73.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Heslingtoii) 18 10. 

My dear Jeffrey, 

I have just had a letter from Horner, who is inclined to think 

Perceval will make a struggle against the Prince. I wish he may, 

and so thoroughly disgust the said Prince, that no future meanness 

will be accepted as an atonement. The best news that Horner 



336 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

sends is, that the Prince has behaved extremely well. It is nonsense 
however to look about in England for political information. The 
most delicate and sensitive turpitude is always to be met with in 
Scotland : there are twenty people in Edinburgh whose manners 
and conduct are more perfect exponents of the King's health than 
the signatures of his physicians. 

I am obliged to you for the kind things you say to me about 
myself. There is nobody, my dear Jeffrey, whose good opinion I 
am more desirous of retaining, or whose sagacity and probity I 
more respect. Living a good deal alone (as I now do) will, I 
believe, correct me of my faults ; for a man can do without his own 
approbation in much society, but he must make great exertions to 
gain it when he lives alone. Without it, I am convinced, solitude 
is not to be endured. 

I have read, since I saw you, Burke's works, some books of 
Homer, Suetonius, a great deal of agricultural reading, Godwin's 
" Enquirer," and a great deal of Adam Smith. As I have scarcely 
looked at a book for five years, I am rather hungry. 

God bless you, dear Jeffrey ! Ever your sincere friend, 

S. S. 



74.] To the Earl Grey. 

January 2, 181 1. 
Dear Lord Grey, 

I congratulate you very sincerely upon the safety of Lady Grey ; 
and I beg you will convey, also, my kind congratulations to her. 
I think now you will not be ashamed to speak with your enemies 
in the gate. 

I have just been reading Allen's account of your Administration. 
Very well done, for the cautious and decorous style : but it is quite 
shameful that a good stout answer has not been written to your 
calumniators. The good points of that Administration were the 
Slave Trade, Newport's Corn Bill, Romilly's Bankrupt Bill, the 
attempt at Peace, and the efforts made for the Catholics. The 
disadvantages under which the Administration laboured were, the 
ruin of Europe — the distress of England — and the hatred of King 
and people. The faults they committed were, not coming to a 
thorough understanding with the King about the Catholics— 
making a treasurer an auditor, and a judge a politician — protecting 
the King's money from decimation — and increasing the number of 
foreign troops. 

Balancing the good and the evil, I am sure there has been no 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 337 

such honest and enlightened Administration since the time of Lord 
Chatham. God send it a speedy return ! 
Ever yours, my dear Lord, with most sincere respect and regard, 

Sydney Smith. 



75.] To the Countess Grey. 

Heslington, York, Jan. 13, 181 1. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

This comes to say that you must not be out of spirits on account 
of Lord Grey's going to town ; but rather thank Providence that 
you did not marry one of those stupid noblemen who are never sent 

for to town on any occasion. Mrs never loses Mr ; Mr 

lives with Mrs ; and Avhy ? Who wants their assistance ? 

What good could they do in any human calamity ? Who would 
send for them, even to consult about losing a tooth ? So that the 
temporary loss of Lord Grey is his glory and yours, and the com- 
mon good. And you are bound to remain quietly in your Red Bell * 
till you become strong enough for travelling. If you are haunted 
by scruples too difficult for Mr (alas ! how easily may any- 
thing be too difficult for Mr !), then pray send for me. 

As I know what a pleasure it is to you to hear or read any good 
praise of Lord Grey, I send you an extract from Mr Horner's letter 
to me this day. " Lord Grey's absence, though scarcely excusable, 
has done no harm. He is decidedly at the head of the great 
aristocracy, including not only Whigs, but a great many Tories. 
I wish he were ... he wants only that, to give him the power of 
doing more good, and commanding greater influence, than any man 
has done since the time of Fox. He deserves all the praises 
bestowed upon him. A more upright, elevated, gallant mind there 
cannot be ; but . . . and will not condescend to humour them, and 
pardon them for their natural infirmities ; nor is aware that both 
people and Prince must be treated like children." 

You may fill up the blanks as you like ; but if you valued Mr 
Horner's understanding and integrity one half as much as I do, you 
would, I am sure, value this praise. 

A pheasant a day is very fattening diet : such has been my mode 
of living for these last few days. I was poetical enough, though, to 
think I had seen them out of my window, at Howick, whilst I was 
dressing, and to fancy that I liked eating them the less on that 
account. 

* A room of Lady Grey's, so called by Mr Sydney Smith, exactly the size of the large 
bell at Moscow. 

Y 



3jS LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Health and happiness, and every good wish, dear Lady Grey, to 
you and yours ! 

Sydney Smith. 



76.] To the Countess Grey. 

Heslington, York, Jan. 24, 181 1. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

Thank you for your obliging and friendly letter. I believe every 
word you say as implicitly as I should if you had never stirred from 
Howick all your life. And this is much to say of any one who has 
lived as much in the high and gay world as you have done. I 
shall be glad to hear that you are safely landed in Portman Square, 
with all your young ones 3 but do not set off too soon, or you will 
be laid up at the Black Swan, Northallerton, or the Elephant and 
Castle, Borough Bridge, and your bill will come to a thousand 
pounds, besides the waiter, who will most probably apply for a 
place under Government. 

We are all perfectly well, and panting to show you in the sum- 
mer, ourselves and York Cathedral. I had occasion to write to 

, and gave her a lecture upon humility, and against receiving 

me with pride and grandeur when I come to town ; I give you no 
such lecture, for I should accost you with as much confidence if you 
were Queen of Persia, because I am quite sure you are power-proof. 
But you will not be put to the test, for the King will recover. The 
late majorities against the Prince are, I think, quite decisive 
that the King's health is improving j but this you know better than 
Ida 

Never was such a ferment as Pall Mall and Holland house are 
in ! John Allen, wild and staring, — Antonio, and Thomas, the 
porter, worked off their legs, — Lord Lauderdale sleeping with his 
clothes on, and a pen full of ink close to his bedside, with a string 
tied on the wrist of his secretary in the next room ! Expresses 
arriving at Pall Mall every ten minutes from the House of 
Commons, and the Whig nobility and commonalty dropping in at 
all hours to dinner or supper ! Is not your Bell better than this ? 
Nevertheless, get well, and quit it. There is great happiness in 
the country, but it requires a visit to London every year to reassure 
yourself of this truth. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OE THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 339 

77.] To Lady Holland. 

January 24, 181 1. 
Dear Lady Holland, 

You will read (perhaps not) — but there will be of mine — in the 
Edinburgh Review a short account of the Walcheren Expedition, 
observations upon Lord Sidmouth's project against Dissenters, and 
Walton's Spanish Colonies. 

If there be a Regency, I guess the following Administration : — 
Lord Grey, First Lord of the Treasury ; Lord Grenville, Foreign 
Office ; Lord Holland, Home Department ; Erskine, Chancellor ; 
Lord Moira, Commander-in-chief; Lord Spencer, Admiralty; 
Romilly and Leach, Attorney and Solicitor ; Pigott, Exchequer 
or Common Pleas ; Tierney, Chancellor of the Exchequer ; Lord 
Lansdowne, Ireland ; Whitbread, Secretary-at-War and Colonies ; 
Abercromby, Secretary of State ; Lord Morpeth, Board of Control ; 
Lord Robert Spencer, National Woodsman. The President of the 
Council and the Privy Seal I cannot guess, unless Lord Stafford 
should be the former ; and it would be much better if Lord Hol- 
land were Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and Lord Grenville for the 
Home Department. 

The drawing-room in Pall Mall must have been an entertaining 
scene for some weeks past : the crowds below waiting upon Allen 
for facts, and acquaintances of 1806 calling above. Lord Lauder- 
dale has, I hear, not had his clothes off for six weeks. Pray 
remember me very kindly to him ; I cannot say how much I like 
him. 

I hope to see your Ladyship early in April, by which time the 
tumult will be hushed, and you will be either in full power, or in 
perfect weakness. 

Sydney Smith. 



78.] To Lady Holland. 

February, 181 1. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I was terribly afraid at first that the Prince had gone over to the 
other party ; but the King's improved condition leaves a hope to 
me that his conduct has been dictated by prudence, and the best 
idea he can form of filial piety from books and chaplains ; for that 
any man in those high regions of life, cares for his father, is what I 
cannot easily believe. That he will gain great popularity from his 
conduct, I have no doubt : — perhaps he may deserve it, but I see 
through a Yorkshire glass, darkly. 

I am exceedingly glad Lord Holland has taken up the business 



340 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

of libels ; the punishment of late appears to me most atrocious. If 
libels against the public are very bad, they become sedition or 
treason ; new crimes may be punished as such ; but as long as 
they are only libels, such punishments as have been lately inflicted 
are preposterous ; and seem to proceed from that hatred which 
feeble and decorous persons always feel against those who disturb 
the repose of their minds, call their opinions in question, and com- 
pel them to think and reason. There should be a maximum of im- 
prisonment for libel. No man should be imprisoned for more than 
a year for any information filed by the Attorney-General. Libels 
are not so mischievous in a free country, as Mr Justice Grose, in 
his very bad lectures, would make them out to be. Who would 
have mutinied for Cobbett's libel ? or who would have risen up 
against the German soldiers ? And how easily might he have been 
answered ! He deserved some punishment ; but to shut a man up 
in gaol for two years for such an offence is most atrocious. Pray 
make Lord Holland speak well and eloquently on this subject. 

Sydney Smith. 



79.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Heslington, Feb. 19, 181 1. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

It is long since I have written to you, — at least, I hope you think 
so. Where is the Review? We are come to the birth, and have 
not strength to bring forth. It is very possible that I have not done 
justice to your article upon the Catholics, but the subject is so worn 
out that I read it hastily ; and though I like almost everything you 
like, I was not violently arrested by any passage. Their exclusion 
from office is, I perceive by the papers, rather strongly put in the 
last Catholic debate, by enumerating, not the classes of offices from 
which they are shut out, but the total number of individual offices 
— thirty-five or forty thousand. This is a striking and popular way 
of putting the fact. 

Do you believe that the Prince made this last change with the 
consent of the Whigs ? I much doubt it ; but if not, his infor- 
mation seems to have been better than theirs ; for, with such an 
immediate prospect of the King's recovery, a change in the Admin- 
istration would have been quite ridiculous. I hope you will make 
some stay with us on your way to town, that Mrs Sydney may see 
something of you. I know you are fond of riding, and I can offer 
you the use of a dun pony, which Murray knows to be a very safe 
and eligible conveyance. This revival of his Majesty has revived 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 341 

my slumbering architecture, and I think I shall begin building this 
year ; yet I get heartily frightened when I think of it. Kirkpatrick's 
" Embassy to Nepaul" is not yet published : so I cannot tell how 
much it will take up. Tell me some subjects for the next number ; 
I have none in contemplation but an article in favour of the Pro- 
testant Dissenters ; and this is premature, as I think their case 
should be kept in the background till that of the Catholics is dis- 
posed of. 

And yet what folly to talk in this manner ! Are we not, like 
Brook Watson's leg, in the jaws of the shark? Can any sensible 
man, — any human being but a little trumpery parson, — believe that 
we shall not be swallowed up ? It is folly not to gather up a little, 
while it is yet possible, and to go to America. We are all very well, 
engaged in the mystery of gardening, and other species of rural 
idleness, for which my taste grows stronger and stronger. 
Ever, dear Jeffrey, affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



80.] To Lady Holland. 

81 Jermyn Street, May 23, 181 1. 

How very odd, dear Lady Holland, to ask me to dine with you on 
Sunday, the 9th, when I am coming to stay with you from the 5th to 
the 1 2th ! It is like giving a gentleman an assignation for Wednes- 
day, when you are going to marry him on the preceding Sunday, 
— an attempt to combine the stimulus of gallantry with the security 
of connubial relations. I do not propose to be guilty of the slightest 
infidelity to you while I am at Holland House, except you dine in 
town ; and then it will not be infidelity, but spirited recrimination. 

Ever the sincere and affectionate friend of Lady Holland, 

Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — I believe no two Dissenting ministers will rejoice at Lord 
Sidmouth's defeat more than Lord Holland and myself. 



81.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Heslingtoii) June 22, 181 1. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
Having quitted Capua, I must now to business. 
I have received the Review, and am extremely pleased with the 
article upon the Liberty of the Press, and with the promise of its 



342 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

continuation. The review of Jacob's Travels I do not like j it is 
full of old grudges. 

You over-praise all Scotch books and writers. Alison's is a 
pretty book, stringing a number of quotations upon a false theory, 
nearly true, and spun out to an unwarrantable size, merely for the 
sake of introducing the illustrations. I have not read your review, 
for I hate the subject ; and you may conceive how much I hate it, 
when even your writing cannot reconcile me to it. 

I am now hardening my heart, and correcting my idleness, as 
quickly as possible ; I mean to be most penitently diligent. 

I saw John Playfair in town — grow thinner and older by some 
years. Mrs Apreece and the Miss Berrys say, that, on the whole, 
he is the only man who can be called irresistible. 

Sydney Smith. 



82.] To Lady Holland. 

Heslington, July 17, i8ii« 
My dear Lady Holland, 
We have had Dugald Stewart and his family here for three or 
four days. We spoke much of the weather and other harmless 
subjects. He become however once a little elevated ; and, in the 
gaiety of his soul, let out some opinions which will doubtless make 
him writhe with remorse. He went so far as to say he considered 
the King's recovery as very problematical. 

The Archbishop says that Lord Ellenborough said to him, " Take 
care of Lord Holland, and I will take care of Romilly. The one 
wants to attack the Church, the other the Law." I assured his 
Grace it was a calumny. 

Sydney Smith. 

83.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Heslington, Dec. 6, 1811. 
My dear Murray, 

I cannot say how much mortified I am not to have reached 
Edinburgh ; nothing should have prevented me but fraternity, and 
to that I was forced to yield.* 

I went to Lord Grey's with young Vernon, the Archbishop's son, 
a very clever young man ; — genus, Whig ; species, Whigista Mitior ; 
of which species I consider Lord Lansdowne to be at the head, as 
the Lords Holland and Grey are of the Whigista Truculentus 
Anactophonus. I heard no news at Howick. Lord Grey sincerely 

* Mr Cecil Smith had lately returned from India. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 343 

expects a change, I taxed him with saying so from policy, but he 
assured me it was his real opinion ; perhaps it was. 

I am reading Locke in my old age, never having read him 
thoroughly in my youth : — a fine, satisfactory sort of fellow, but 
very long-winded. 

You do not know, perhaps, that among my thousand and one 
projects is to be numbered a new metaphysical language, — a bold 
fancy for any man not born in Scotland. Physics, metaphysics, 
gardening, and jobbing are the privileges of the North. By the 
by, have you ever remarked that singular verse in the Psalms, 
" Promotion cometh neither from the east, nor from the west, 
neither from the south?" 

I rather quarrel with you for not sending me some Edinburgh 
politics. I have a very sincere attachment to Scotland, and am 
very much interested by Scotch news. Five of the most agreeable 
years of my life were spent there. I have formed many friendships 
which I am sure will last as long as I live. 

Adieu, dear Murray ! Pray write to me. 

Ever your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



84.] To Mrs Apreece.* 

Heslington, Dec. 29, 181 1. 
My dear Mrs Apreece, 

I am very much flattered by your recollection of me, and by 
your obliging letter. I have been following the plough. My talk 
has been of oxen, and I have gloried in the goad. 

Your letter operated as a charm. I remembered that there were 
better things than these ; — that there was a metropolis ; that there 
were wits, chemists, poets, splendid feasts, and captivating women. 
Why remind a Yorkshire resident clergyman of these things, and 
put him to recollect human beings at Rome, when he is fattening 
beasts at Ephesus ? 

The Edinburgh Review is just come out, — long and dull, as 
usual ; to these bad results and effects I have contributed, in a 
review of Wyvill's " Papers on Toleration." 

I shall be in London in March. Pray remain single, and marry 
nobody (let him be whom he may) : you will be annihilated the 
moment you do, and, instead of an alkali or an acid, become a 
neutral salt. You may very likely be happier yourself, but you will 
be lost to your male friends. 

* Afterwards Lady Davy. 



344 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

My brother is a capital personage ; full of sense, genius, dignity, 
virtue, and wit. 

God bless you, dear Mrs Apreece 1 Kind love from all here 1 

S. S. 

P.S. — That rogue Jeffrey will have the whip-hand of me for a 
month ; but I will annihilate him when I come up, if he gives him- 
self airs, and affects to patronise me. Mind and cultivate Whishaw, 
and Dumont, and Tennant. 



85.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

January, 18 12. 
Dear Jeffrey, 
I certainly am very intolerant and impatient, and I will endea- 
vour to be less so, but do not be hurt by my critiques on your 
criticisms ; you know (if you know anything) the love and respect 
I have for you ; this is not enough — add also, the very high ad- 
miration. But it is the great fault of our Review that our wisdom 
is too long ; it did well at first, because it was new to find so much 
understanding in a journal. But every man takes up a Review 
with a lazy spirit, and wishes to get wise at a cheap rate, and to 
cross the country by a shorter path. Health and respect ! 

Sydney Smith. 



86.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

June, 1 812. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I feel that I owe you an apology for troubling you so often about 
the Review ; but I am really desirous of doing something for it, 
and, in my search for new books, they turn up at different times, 
and compel me to make these different appeals to you. The sub- 
jects I have already mentioned are : — 1st, Sir F. Burdett on the 
Law of Imprisonment for Libel ; 2d, The Statement of the late 
Negotiations ; 3d, The Duke of Sussex's speech ; 4th (and now 
for the first time), Halliday's " Observations on the Present State 
of the Portuguese Army ; " in which I propose to include some 
short statement of, and observations upon, Lord Wellington's 
campaigns in Portugal. The last undertaking is the only one to 
which a fresh answer is required from you. 

Horner is, I think, getting better. There never was a period 
when the hopes of good Whigs were so cruelly disappointed. I 
dare say Lords Grey and Grenville meant extremely well, but they 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 345 

have bungled the matter so as to put themselves in the wrong, 
both with the public and with their own troops. The bad faith of 
the Court is nothing. If they had suspected that bad faith, they 
should have put it to the proof, and made it clear to all the world 
that the Court did not mean them well ; at present they have made 
the Court the object of public love and compassion, made Lord 
Yarmouth appear like a virtuous man, given character to the 
Prince, and restored the dilapidation of kingly power. 

I write from Cambridge, and shall be at York on Friday to 
dinner. Adieu ! and believe me ever your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



87.] To the Earl Grey. 

Heslmglon, August 17, 1812. 
Dear Lord Grey, 

I really think you are unjust to . He may be capricious, 

unjust, fickle, a thousand faults ; but, if you mean by discreditable 
motives, any love of office or concern about it, I sincerely think 
him exempted from any feelings of that nature. 

I suppose you know by this time the nature of Canning's last 
negotiation ; if not, he was to have come in with two members in 
a Cabinet of fifteen ; and Lord Liverpool, who negotiated the 
arrangement, conceived it to be agreed between Lord Castlereagh 
and Canning that they were to enjoy co-ordinate power and im- 
portance in the Commons, — at least, as much as any ministerial 
arrangement could confer equal power upon such unequal men. 
In a subsequent explanation, however, it turned out that Lord 
Castlereagh had no such intentions ; that he intended to keep the 
lead in the House of Commons, and to be considered as the 
Minister of the Crown in that assembly. This put an end to the 
negotiation. 

I do not know whether you like praise, but I cannot help saying 
how much I was struck with your style of writing in the State 
Papers published by Lord Moira. It is impossible that anything can 
be more clear, manly, and dignified ; it is a perfect model for State- 
paper writing. After saying thus much of the mode, it is right to 
add, I am the critic in the Edinburgh Review upon the substance 
of the negotiation. I have given reasons for my opinion, preserving, 
as I hope and intended and felt, the greatest possible respect for 
you ; but I am foolish in supposing that you heed or read the 
obscure speculations of reviewers and scribblers. 

I remain ever, my dear Lord Grey, very truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



346 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

88.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

September, 1812. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I have to thank you for many kind letters, which I would have 
answered sooner, but that I have been expecting the Review, upon 
which I wished to offer you my opinion. 

I like the review of Malcolm very much ; there is such an 
appearance of profound knowledge of the subject, joined to so very 
gentlemanlike a spirit of forbearance, that it gives me considerable 
pleasure. I liked very much the article on Peace, and the review 
on Miss Edgeworth ; John Knox I have not yet read. I am very 
glad you like my review of the Negotiation ; pray tell me if it is 
much complained of by the Whigs. I shall not regret having 
written it if it is ; but if I reconcile the interests of truth with the 
feelings of party, so much the better ; I am sure it is the good 
sense and justice of the question. 

Whilst I write, our poor, amiable old friend is mouldering in her 
tomb ; I had a most sincere affection for her, and such a friend I 
shall not soon replace, and I feel the loss with very sincere grief. 

Miss is deeply affected : she is made up of fine feelings, and 

her mother filled her whole heart and soul. 

I know not how to rejoice in the useless splendour of Lord 
Wellington's achievements, for I am quite a disbeliever in his 
ultimate success ; but I am incapable of thinking of anything but 
building, and my whole soul is filled up by lath and plaster. 

Mrs Fletcher has been here and dined with us, — self and spouse. 
I was surprised to find her unaffected, and more sensible than from 
her blazing sort of reputation I had supposed to be the case ; more 
handsome, too, than I had judged her in Edinburgh : in short, she 
produced a very agreeable impression both upon Mrs Sydney and 
me. 

I see Seymour is selling his Scotch place. I am glad to find 
you are in the country, for then I am sure you are happy. 

Yours affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 



89.] To John Allen, Esq. 

December 29, 1812. 
My dear Allen, 
I thank you sincerely for your friendly and considerate com- 
munication respecting the opinion of the Archbishop. 
You may easily imagine that I have reflected a good deal upon 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 347 

the expediency of an undertaking so very serious as that of building. 
I may very likely have determined wrong, but I have determined 
to the best of my judgment, anxiously and actively exerted. I 
have no public or private chance of changing my situation for the 
better ; such good fortune may occur, but I have no right to 
presume upon it. I have waited and tried for six years, and I am 
bound in common prudence to suppose that my lot is fixed in this 
land. That being so, what am I to do ? I have no certainty of my 
present house ; the distance is a great and serious inconvenience ; 
if I am turned out of it, it will be scarcely possible, in so thinly- 
inhabited a country, to find another. I am totally neglecting my 
parish. I ought to build ; if I were bishop, I would compel a 
man in my situation to build ; and should think that any incumbent 
acted an ungentlemanlike part who compelled me to compel him, 
and who did not take up the money which is lent by the Governors 
of Queen Anne's bounty for the purpose of building. 

Such, I conceived, would be the Archbishop's opinion of me had I 
availed myself of his good-nature to apply for perpetual absence 
from my living, and for permission to live in hired houses. In 
all conversations I have had with him, he has never discouraged 
the idea of building, but, on the contrary, always appeared to 
approve and promote it. I am therefore surprised not a little at 
what you tell me, and can only interpret it to mean that he would 
not absolutely have compelled me to build, but that he would have 
thought it mean and unfair in me not to have made an exertion of 
that kind. His mere forbearance from the use of authority is an 
additional reason for beginning. Lastly, I have gone so far that 
even if the communication were more authorised and direct, I could 
hardly recede. To kick down the money I have been saving for 
my family has cost me a great deal of uneasiness, and at one time 
I had thought of resigning my living. Having now decided 
according to the best means of an understanding extremely prone 
to error, nothing remains but to fight through my difficulties as 
well as I can. 

It will give me sincere pleasure to think that you take an interest 
in my well-doing (not that I doubted it), but a particular instance 
(like this) is more cheering than a general belief. 

Health, happiness, and as many new years as you wish ! 

Sydney Smith. 



348 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

90.] To John Allen, Esq. 

January 1, 18 13. 
My dear Allen, 

As to politics, everything is fast setting in for arbitrary power. 
The Court will grow bolder and bolder ; a struggle will comm ence, 
and if it ends as I wish, there will be Whigs again, or if not, a Whig 
will be an animal described in books of natural history, and Lord 
Grey's bones will be put together and shown, by the side of the 
monument, at the Liverpool Museum. But when these things 
come to pass, you will no longer be a Warden, but a brown and 
impalpable powder in the tombs of Dulwich. In the meantime, 
enough of liberty will remain to make our old age tolerably com- 
fortable ; and to your last gasp you will remain in the perennial 
and pleasing delusion that the Whigs are coming in, and will expire 
mistaking the officiating clergyman for a King's messenger. 

But whatever your feelings be on this matter, mine for you will 
be always those of the most sincere respect and regard. Yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



91.] To Lady Holland. 

January 17, 1813. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
I have innumerable thanks to return to you for the kind solici- 
tude you have displayed respecting my rural architecture. I have 
explained myself so fully to Allen upon the convenience and neces- 
sity of this measure, that I will not bore you any more with the 
subject ; but I must add a word upon the Archbishop's conversa- 
tion with Abercromby. Is it not a little singular, that his Grace, 
in all the various conversations I have had with him on this sub- 
ject, — on the promise I made to him to build, — on the complaints 
I have frequently made to him of the great hardships and expense 
of building, when I laid before him my plans, — that he should 
never have given me the most distant hint, directly or indirectly, 
that such a process could be in honour dispensed with? Is it not 
singular that he should have reserved this friendly charge of super- 
erogation, till I had burnt my bricks, bought my timber, and got 
into a situation in which it was more prudent to advance than to 
recede ? The archbishop is a friendly, good man ; but such is not 
the manner of laymen. It would be a bad comfort to an Indian 
widow, who was half-burnt, if the head Brahmin were to call out to 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 349 

her, " Remember, it is your own act and deed ; I never ordered you 
to burn yourself." 

We have had meetings here of the clergy, upon the subject of the 
Catholic question, but none in my district ; if there be, I shall cer- 
tainly give my solitary voice in favour of religious liberty, and shall 
probably be tossed in a blanket for my pains. 

Conceive the horror of fourteen men hung yesterday ! And yet 
it is difficult to blame the judges for it, though it would be some 
relief to be able to blame them. The murderers of Horsefall were 
all Methodists ; one of them, I believe, a preacher. 

I hope you will take a ramble to the North this year. You want 
a tour ; nothing does you so much good. Come and alarm the 
village, as you did before. Your coming has produced the same 
impression as the march of Alexander or Bacchus over India, and 
will be as long remembered in the traditions of the innocent natives. 
They still believe Antonio to have been an ape. Pray accept a 
Yorkshire ham, which set off yesterday, directed to Lord Holland, 
St James's Square, by waggon which comes to the Bull and Mouth ; 
it weighs twenty pounds. I mention these particulars, because, 
when a thing is sent, it may as well be received, and not be 
changed. 

Sydney Smith. 



92.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Bath, January 24, 18 13. 
My dear Allen, 

Vernon* has mistaken the object of my letter, and I have written 
to tell him so. I had no other object in writing to him than to say 
this : " Do not let the Archbishop imagine that I have either con- 
ceived or represented myself to be the martyr of his severity. 1 
never thought I should be compelled, though I had no doubt I 
should be expected, to build, and fairly expected ; and when any 
man who can command me to do a just thing, does not command 
me because he is afraid of appearing harsh, his forbearance is, and 
ought to be, as powerful as any mandate." 

Vernon's reply to my first letter contains an express permission 
from the Archbishop to recede from my engagement, if I think fit. 
To this I have answered (with every expression of gratitude for the 
intention) that it comes too late ; that I have incurred expenses and 
engagements which render it imprudent and impossible to retreat ; 
that had I known myself two years ago to have been a free agent, 
as I now find I might have been, I would have set myself sincerely 

* Mr Vernon Harcourt, son of the late Archbishop of York. 



3 5o LE TTERS OF THE REV. S YDNE Y SMITH. 

to work to find out some habitation without building ; that I am 
convinced his Grace was misled by my light manner of talking of 
these matters, and never imagined me to be in earnest, or he would 
have expressed to me, when I made my promises, his opinion, 
which I have now received, and through the same friendly channel; 
lastly, that I believe, after all, I have done the wisest thing, and that 
by doing and suffering, I have no doubt of scrambling through my 
difficulties. This, said in as kind and civil a manner as I could 
adopt, was the substance of my answer to Vernon, and is of course 
my answer to the very kind and friendly remonstrances I have re- 
ceived from you. 

When I say that I shall pass my life at Foston, I by no means 
intend to take a desponding view of my situation, or to doubt the 
kindness of those friends whom I love so sincerely, and from whom 
I have already received obligations which I never can forget while 
I can remember anything. But their power to do me good depends 
upon accidents upon which it would be folly in any man to found a 
regular calculation. Those accidental visitations of fortune are like 
prizes in the lottery, which must not be put into the year's income 
till they turn up. My fancy is my own : I may see as many crosiers 
in the clouds as I please ; but when I sit down seriously to consider 
what I shall do upon important occasions, I must presume myself 
rector of Foston for life. 

I shall be in town Wednesday night late, and stay only four or 
five days. 

What you say about the Whigs, the measure you take of their 
usefulness, and of the share of power they may enjoy, is fair and 
reasonable. 

Ever most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



93.] To Robert Smith, Esq. 

March 17, 181 3. 
My dear Bobus, 

It seems to me a long time since I heard from you. Pray write 
to me, and if you are vexed, or uneasy, or dispirited, do not be too 
proud to say so. 

I have heard about you from various good judges, all of whom 
concur in the statement made to me from Holland House ; that 
the coach appeared to be made of admirable materials, and that 
its breaking down was a mere accident, for which it is impossible 
to account. I see you have spoken again, but your speech is only 
given in my three days' paper, and that very concisely. If you said 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 351 

what you had to say without a fresh attack of nervousness, this is 
all I care about. If the body does not play you these tricks, I 
have no fear of the mind. By the by, you will laugh at me, but I 
am convinced a working senator should lead a life like an athlete. 
I wish you would let me send you a horse, and that you would ride 
every morning ten or fifteen miles before breakfast, and fling yourself 
into a profuse perspiration. No man ever stopped in a speech, that 
had perspired copiously that day. Do you disdain the assistance of 
notes ? 

I am going on prosperously with my buildings, but I am not yet 
out of sight of land. We most earnestly hope nothing will prevent 
you this year from coming down into Yorkshire. I have learnt to 
ride backwards and forwards to my living since I saw you, by 
which means I do not sleep away from home ; — and I have found 
so good a manager of my accounts, that one day a week is sufficient 
for me to give up to my buildings. 

When you have done anything that pleases yourself, write me 
word ; it will give me the most unfeigned pleasure. Whether you 
turn out a consummate orator or not, will neither increase nor 
diminish my admiration for your talents or my respect for your 
character ; — but when a man is strong, it is pleasant to make that 
strength respected ; — and you will be happier for it, if you can do 
so (as I have no doubt you will soon). 

My very kind love to Caroline and the children, and believe me 
ever your affectionate brother, 

Sydney Smith. 



94.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

April 6, 1 813. 
Dear Jeffrey, 

You write me a letter dated the 16th, in which you tell me you 
have sent me something ; doubtless you suppose you have done so, 
but you have not. How goes on the next number ? I am always 
afraid to ask this question, because I always expect to hear that 
the Review is dead or dying. I have but one occupation now, — 
building a house, which requires all my time and attention : I live 
trowel in hand. 

I am much disappointed at . I had expected him to turn 

out a second Demosthenes, or even a second Jeffrey ; how very 
much it must surprise you that anybody stops who has begun to 
speak ! 

I long very much to see you : we are old friends, I have a great 
affection for you, and admiration of your understanding, yet we 



352 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

never meet ; some spell binds you to Edinburgh, — that town where 
so many philosopers " think unknown, and waste no sweetness on 
the desert air." 

The Miss are to come down to us in the month of June ; 

why not come and marry ? I will answer for it she will have 

you ; by the by, I hear you are going to be married, but that I 
have heard so many times that it produces no impression on me. 
Mackintosh says you are the cleverest man he ever met with in 
his life. 

Sydney Smith. 



95.] To Robert Smith, Esq. 

Hcslijigton, York, May 10, 181 3. 
My dear Bobus, 

Maria writes Mrs Sydney word that you are not quite so stout 
as you used to be. Pray take care of yourself. Let us contrive to 
last out for the same or nearly the same time : weary will be the 
latter half of my pilgrimage, if you leave me in the lurch ! * By 
the by, I wish Mrs Smith and you would promise to inform me if 
you are ever seriously ill. I should come up to you at a moment's 
warning, and should be very unhappy if the opportunity were not 
given me of doing so. 

I was very much pleased with Canning's additions to Grattan's 
Bills ; they are very wise, because they give satisfaction to the 
great mass of fools, of whom the public is composed, and who really 
believe there is danger in conceding so much to the Catholics. 

I cannot help detailing to you a remark of Douglas's, which in 
Scotland would be heard as of high metaphysical promise. Emily 
was asking why one flower was blue, and another pink, and another 
yellow. "Why, in short," said Douglas, "it is their nature; and when 
we say that, what do we mean ? It is only another word for mystery ; 
it only means that we know nothing at all abont the matter? This 
observation from a child eight years old is not common. 

We are threatened with a visit from the excellent Greek, I under- 
stand, who is conducting his young warrior to the north. How 
contemptible our modern way of arming must appear to him ! He 
will doubtless speak to the Colonel about the fighting in Homer, 
and the mode of it. 

God bless you, dear Bobus ! Love to your dear children. 

Sydney Smith. 

* Mr Robert Smith died within a fortnight of his brother. See Memoir, page 260.— 
Ed. 



LETTERS' OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 353 



06.I To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Heslington. Xo date : stippqsed about 18 13. 

My dear Jeffrey, 3^V 

It is with great concern that I hear of your illnesi, and should 
be much obliged to joa"," IfBteU* fl£& fEIsftre, to writ* me a line 
to say how ygu are. I need not say how very happ&Ve should be 
to see you hare ; and I wish you seriously to consider whether 
some time passed in the country will not tend more than anything 
else to establish your health. I know it is the season of law busi- 
ness, but Editor is salus, litpfemi* fc.r. 

I have been passing some weeks of dissipation in London ; and 
was transformed by Circe's cup, not into a brute, but a beau. I 
am now eating the herb moly in the country. Near as the time 
approaches to the Review, I should not have been an idle contri- 
butor, but that I am forced to do many things for my brother Cecil, 
who has come from India in consequence of a quarrel with Sir G. 
Barlow, and who has much to arrange and settle with respect to 
the state of affairs there, and of Indian intrigues here. If I send 
you one or two light and insignificant articles, it will be all that I 
can possibly contribute. Do you mean to send me the lucubrations 
of Playfair and Knight touching Mr Copplestone ? 

I am sure you will excuse me for saying that I was struck with 
nothing in your " State of Parties" but its extreme temerity, and 
with the incorrectness of its statements. I was not struck with the 
good writing, because in you that is a matter of course ; but I be- 
lieve there never was so wrong an exposition of the political state 
of any country : to say we are approximating towards it, may be 
true ; and so is a child just born approximating to old age. I 
believe you take your notions of the state of opinion in Britain, 
from the state of opinion among the commercial and manufacturing 
population of your own country ; overlooking the great mass of 
English landed proprietors, who, leaning always a little towards the 
Crown, would still rally round the Constitution and moderate prin- 
ciples, whenever the state of affairs came to be such as to make 
their interference necessary. If this notion of your review were 
merely my own, I should send it with more of apology, but it is 
that of the most sensible men I have met. 

And why do you not scout more that pernicious cant, that all 
men are equal ? As politicians, they do not differ, as Locke thinks 
they do ; but they differ enough to make you and all worthy men 
sincerely wish for the elevation of the one, and the rejection of the 
other. 

Z 



354 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

God bless you, my dear Jeffrey ! Get well ; come here to do so. 
Accept my best wishes, and believe me affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



97.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Heslington, July 12, 18 13. 
My dear Murray, 

I understand you are one of the Commissioners for managing 
the Edinburgh Review, in the absence of our small-bodied, great- 
minded leader. He has made to me an affecting appeal for assist- 
ance, and, for such as I can afford, shall not make it in vain ; the 
difficulty is to find books, and I will review any two of the following 
— Clarkson's " Life of Penn," Buchanan's " Colonial Establish- 
ment," Thompson's " Travels in Sweden," Graham's " Residence in 
India," or Horsley's " Speeches." Have the goodness, if you please, 
to tell me which of these I shall take, and at what time I shall send 
them, giving me all the time you can, for I really am distressed for 
that article. 

My situation is as follows : — I am engaged in agriculture without 
the slightest knowledge of the art ; I am building a house without 
an architect ; and educating a son without patience ! Nothing 
short of my sincere affection for Jeffrey, and pity for his trans- 
atlantic loves, should have induced me to draw my goose-quill. 

My new mansion springs up apace, and then I shall really have 
a pretty place to receive you in, and a pleasant country to show you. 
Remember me very kindly to all my friends, and believe me, my 
dear Murray, ever most sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



98.] To John Murray, Esq. 

August 1%, 18 1 3. 
*Dear Murray, 
It is my serious intention to lend such aid as I can lend to the 
Review, in Jeffrey's absence. To render this intention useful, I 
hope he has left somebody who will look after the temporal con- 
cerns of the Review, and return an answer to those questions which 
a distant contributor must necessarily put. It was my intention to 
review Ferrier's " Theory of Apparitions ; " but it is such a null, 
frivolous book, that it is impossible to take any notice of it. I 
request therefore the choice of these subjects :— -Milne's Contro- 
versy with Marsh, Pouqueville's " Travels in the Morea," Brough- 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 355 

ton's " Letters from a Mahratta Camp," or Sir J. Porter's " Account 
of the last Russian Campaign." I should prefer the first and the 
last. Pray let me know whether I may do them, or obtain, if you 
will be so good, an immediate answer for me from those with whom 
the power rests. I will take the first opportunity of returning 
Ferrier's " Apparitions " to Constable. 

My brother and all his family are with me. 

I am sorry to hear of the loss of your old friend ; such losses are 
seldom or never repaired ; a friend made at a middle period of life 
is never like a friend made at its beginning. I am sure a run in the 
country in England would do you good. It is the misfortune of 
Edinburgh men that they see no fools and common persons (I 
mean, of clever men in Edinburgh) ; I could put you on a salutary 
course of this sort of society. Ever most sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



99.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Heslington, Sept. 1, 181 3. 
My dear Murray, 
Barring accidents, I undertake for Broughton's " Letters from a 
Mahratta Camp," and Porter's " Russian Campaign;" perhaps also 
Milner and Marsh. I would with pleasure comply with your re- 
quest about Walpole, but find a most alarming good-nature increas- 
ing upon me from year to year, which renders me almost incapable 
of the task ; but I will try. 

I do not want the proofs, if any of the commissioners will be so 
good as to attend to the corrections : for, I assure you, little Jeffrey 
sometimes leaves the printing in such a state of absolute nonsense 
as throws me into the coldest of sweats. 

Yours, my dear Murray, very sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 



100.] To Lady Holland. 

September 17, 1813. 
Dear Lady Holland, 
Few events are of so little consequence as the fecundity of a 
clergyman's wife ; still your kind dispositions towards me justify 
me in letting you know that Mrs Sydney and her new-born son are 
both extremely well. His name will be Grafton, and I shall bring 
him up a Methodist and a Tory. Affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



356 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

ioi.] To John Murray, Esq. 

October 15, 18 13. 
My dear Murray, 
I am quite ashamed of not having better fulfilled my promise ; 
but, first, Mrs Sydney has been confined ; second, I am building a 
house ; third, educating a son ; fourth, entering upon a farm ; fifth, 
after reading half through Porter's " Russian Campaign," I find it 
such an incorrigible mass of folly and stupidity, that nothing could 
be said of it but what was grossly abusive. 

I have read the controversy about the Auxiliary Bible Society, 
and will speedily send you an article upon it. 

Sydney Smith. 

I can give you no account of Mackintosh, nor tell you how he 
is to be stimulated. 



102.] To John Murray, Esq. 

November 29, 18 13. 
My dear Murray, 

I am sorry the editors of the Review should so construe my 
article as to suppose it inimical to the free circulation of the Scrip- 
tures. I do not dissuade anybody from circulating the Scriptures ; 
but merely say to a particular body of men, " You are bound in 
consistency to circulate the Scriptures with the Prayer-book, in 
preference to any other method." Nothing can be more ridiculous 
than the whole contest ; but as it exists, I thought it right to notice 
it. Pray regulate the pecuniary concerns of the Review as you 
think best, and I shall be obliged to you to return my review when 
you have an opportunity of procuring a frank. 

I am ashamed to say I have not read Brougham's article upon 
education ; but I stated my argument to him in the summer, and 
he completely acquiesced in it. 

I remain, dear Murray, in haste, yours very truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



103.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Heslington, Jan. 13, 18 14. 
My dear Allen, 
I did not know before your letter that Lord Holland had been 
ill, and I received the intelligence, as you may suppose, with sin- 
cere regret. It is very easy and old-womanish to offer advice^ but 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 357 

I wish he would leave off wine entirely, after the manner of the 
Sharpe and Rogers school. He is never guilty of excess ; but 
there is a certain respectable and dangerous plenitude, not quite 
conducive to that state of health which all his friends most wish to 
Lord Holland. 

What can you possibly mean by lamenting the restoration of the 
Bourbons ? What so likely to promote renewed peace, and enable 
the French to lay some slight foundation of real liberty ? for as to 
their becoming free at once, it is a mere joke. I think I see your 
old Edinburgh hatred of the Bourbons ; but the misfortunes of the 
world have been such as to render even these contemptible person- 
ages our hope and our refuge. 

We are all well, and I persevere in my intention of entering on 
my new house on the 25th of March. 

I hear great complaints of Mackintosh's review of Madame de 
Stael, as too laudatory. Of this I cannot judge, as I have not read 
the original ; but the review itself is very splendid, though (as is the 
case with all these polishers of precious stones) I remember of old 
many of the phrases and many of the opinions. 

I am going to educate my little boy till he is twelve years old, 
being at present nine ; and if I could get a clever boy to educate 
with him, I should be glad to do so. I would not take any boy 
who was not quick and clever, for such (unless the ordinary par- 
tiality of a parent mislead me) is Douglas ; but I rather suppose it 
is too far from town for these sort of engagements. 

There is a bad account of , and no wonder ; the loss has 

been very severe, and he has never met with any check, but gone 
away before the wind all his life. 

It will be very kind of you to write me a line now and then, and 
if you will have the goodness to do this, pray let me know how 
Mackintosh's speech went off: I have only the account of an 
honest citizen of York. 

Pray tell Lady Holland I am a Justice of the Peace,— one of 
those rural tyrants so deprecated by poor Windham. I am deter- 
mined to strike into the line of analogous punishments. 

Ever most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



104.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Htslington, March, 18 14. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
When I tell you this is the last week of my old house, and that 
we are in all the agonies of departure and of packing up, you will 



358 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

excuse me that I have not written to you before. Accept my sin- 
cere congratulations, offered deliberately and upon reflection. The 
heart of man must have its cravings satisfied, as well as those of 
his belly. You have got a wife, — that is, something to love,— and 
you will be all the happier for it ! I pronounce my benediction on 
the whole business. 

I am obliged to you for the Review, which I have not had time 
to read. Brougham is, I believe, at York ; but I have been away 
since the Circuit entered, and living at my farmhouse lodgings, to 
superintend my buildings. 

Pray explain to me what is or was intended, respecting the 
statues of Playfair and Stewart. I object to the marble compli- 
ment : it should have been a compliment in oil-paint, or, if marble, 
should have come down only to the shoulders ; for if Playfair and 
Stewart (excellent men and writers as they are) are allowed marble 
from top to toe, what is there left for Newton, Washington, and 
Lord Wellington ? My dilemma in this laudatory scheme is this : 
— if Playfair and Stewart do not see the error and impropriety of 
the plan, they are not worthy of a statue ; and if they do, it would 
be exceedingly wrong to erect one to them ! People in England 
have a very bad habit of laughing at Scotch economy ; and the 
supposition was that the statue was to be Januform, with Playfair's 
face on one side, and Stewart's on the other ; and it certainly 
would effect a reduction in price, though it would be somewhat 
singular. 

I have not read a paper for these four days ; but this lingering 
war will not do for Buonaparte. The white cockade will be up, if 
he do not proceed more rapidly. I have no doubt but that the 
Bourbons must have a very large party in France, consisting of all 
those who love stability and peace better than eternal war and 
agitation ; but these men have necessarily a great dread of Buona- 
parte, — a great belief in his skill, fortune, and implacability. It 
will take them years after he is killed to believe that he is dead. 

Can I be of any service for the next number of the Review ? I 
shall be very happy to be so, if anything occur, and if (as I now 
think I shall have) I have leisure to attend to it. We are all 
extremely well ; Mrs Sydney, never better. Pray remember me, 
dear Jeffrey, and say a good word for me if I die first. I shall say 
many for you in the contrary event ! 

When shall I see Scotland again? Never shall I forget the 
happy days I passed there, amidst odious smells, barbarous sounds, 
bad suppers, excellent hearts, and most enlightened and cultivated 
understandings ! 

Ever your most sincere friend, 

S. S. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 359 

105.] To John Allen, Esq. 

March 10, 18 14. 
Dear Allen, 
I cannot at all enter into your feelings about the Bourbons, nor 
can I attend to so remote an evil as the encouragement to super- 
stitious attachment to kings, when the proposed evil of a military 
ministry, or of thirty years more of war, is before my eyes. I want 
to get rid of this great disturber of human happiness, and I scarcely 
know any price too great to effect it. If you were sailing from 
Alicant to Aleppo in a storm, and, after the sailors had held up the 
image of a saint and prayed to it, the storm were to abate, you 
would be more sorry for the encouragement of superstition than 
rejoiced at the preservation of your life ; and so would every other 
man born and bred in Edinburgh. 

My views of the matter would be much shorter and coarser : I 
should be so glad to find myself alive, that I should not care a 
farthing if the storm had generated a thousand new, and revived as 
many old saints. How can any man stop in the midst of the 
stupendous joy of getting rid of Buonaparte, and prophesy a thousand 
little peddling evils that will result from restoring the Bourbons ? 
The most important of all objects is the independence of Europe : 
it has been twice very nearly destroyed by the French ; it is 
menaced from no other quarter ; the people must be identified 
with their sovereign. There is no help for it ; it will teach them in 
future to hang kings who set up for conquerors. I will not believe 
that the Bourbons have no party in France. My only knowledge 
of politics is from the York paper ; yet nothing shall convince me 
that the people are not heartily tired of Buonaparte, and ardently 
wish for the cessation of the conscription ; that is, for the 
Bourbons. 

I shall be in my house by the 25 th of March, in spite of all the 
evils that are prophesied against me. I have had eleven fires burn- 
ing night and day for these two months past. 

I am glad to hear that the intention of raising a statue to Play- 
fair and Stewart is now reported to have been only a joke. This 
is wilt, not wit; by way of pleasantry, the oddest conceit I have 
heard of ; but you gentlemen from the North are, you know, a little 
singular in your conceptions of the lefiid. I quoted to Whishaw the 

behaviour of , under similar circumstances ; I wonder if 

Stewart and Playfair would have behaved with as much modesty, 
had this joke dropped down into a matter of fact. 

We are all well ; but Douglas alarmed us the other night with 
the croup. I darted into him all the mineral and vegetable re- 



360 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

sources of the shops, — cravatted his throat with blisters, and fringed 
it with leeches, and set him in five or six hours to playing marbles, 
breathing gently and inaudibly. 

Pray send me some news when there is any. It is very pleasant 
in these deserts to see the handwriting of an old friend ; it is like 
the print in the sand seen by Robinson Crusoe. 

I am reading Neale's " History of the Puritans ;" read it if you 
have never read it, and make my Lady read it. Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



io6\] To John Allen, Esq. 

Foston, April, 1814. 
Dear Allen, 

I write you a short note to thank you sincerely for your friendly 
advice on going into my house. My great dread is not of damp, 
but of cold damp ; and therefore I trust to excellent fires, to be 
kept up night and day ; and the first week has justified my con- 
fidence. I am very much pleased with my house. I aimed at 
making a snug parsonage, and I think I have succeeded. I hope, 
one day or other, you will criticise from the spot. 

I am sorry to see the war degenerating into a war of dynasties, 
— the great evil to be dreaded from a weak Administration, and 
into which they seem to have completely fallen. 

I should be very glad to come to town a little this spring, but I 
am afraid I cannot ; I shall however make an effort. I wish you 
had said a word about Lord and Lady Holland. Pray give to them 
my best and kindest regards. Yours, &c, 

Sydney Smith. 



107.] To Lady Holland. 

Foston , June 25, 181 4. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I set off on Tuesday morning, and reached home on Wednesday 
night by ten o'clock, finding everybody very well, and delighting 
them not a little next clay by the display of your French presents ; 
but of this Mrs Sydney will speak herself. 

I liked London better than ever I liked it before, and simply, I 
believe, from water-drinking. Without this, London is stupefaction 
and inflammation. It is not the love of wine, but thoughtlessness 
and unconscious imitation : other men poke out their hands for 
the revolving wine, and one does the same, without thinking of it. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 361 

All people above the condition of labourers are ruined by excess of 
stimulus and nourishment, clergy included. I never yet saw any 
gentleman who ate and drank as little as was reasonable. 

I am uneasy, dear Lady Holland, at your going abroad. Con- 
sider what it is to be well. If I were you, I would not stir from 
Holland House for two years ; and then, as many jolts and frights 
as you please, which at present you are not equal to. I should 
think you less to blame if the world had anything new to show 
you ; but you have seen the Parthian, the Mede, &c. &c. &c. ; no 
variety of garment can surprise you, and the roads upon the earth 
are as well known to you as the wrinkles in 's face. 

Be wise, my dear lady, and re-establish your health in that gilded 
room which furnishes better and pleasanter society than all the 
wheels in the world can whirl you to. Believe me, dear Lady Hol- 
land, your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



108.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

1814. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I am much obliged to you for the Review, and shall exercise the 
privilege of an old friend in making some observations upon it. 
I have not read the review of Wordsworth, because the subject is 
to me so very uninteresting ; but, may I ask, do not such repeated 
attacks upon a man wear in some little degree the shape of per- 
secution ? 

Without understanding anything of the subject, I was much 
pleased with the " Cassegrainian Telescope," as it seemed modest, 
moderate in rebuke, and to have the air of wisdom and erudition. 
The account of Scotch husbandry is somewhat coxcombical, and 
has the fault of digressing too much into political economy ; but I 
should guess it to be written by a very good farmer ; — I mean, by 
a man thoroughly acquainted with the method in which the art 
is carried on. I delight in the article on Carnot ; it is virtuous 
and honourable to do justice to such a man. I should guess that 
the travels of the Frenchman in England are those of your friend 
and relation, M. Simond. 

With respect to what you say of your occasional feelings of dis- 
gust at your office of editor, and half-formed intentions of giving it 
up, I think you should be slow to give up so much emolument, now 
that you are married and may have a family ; but if you can get as 
great an income by your profession, and the two cannot be com- 
bined, I would rather see you a great lawyer than a witty journalist. 



362 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

There can be no doubt which is the most honourable and lucrative 
situation, and not much doubt which is the most useful. 

It will give us the greatest pleasure to see you in the spring, or, 
if not then, in your excursion to France. I like my new house very 
much ; it is very comfortable, and, after finishing it, I would not 
pay sixpence to alter it ; but the expense of it will keep me a very 
poor man, a close prisoner here for my life, and render the educa- 
tion of my children a difficult exertion for me. My situation is one 
of great solitude; but I preserve myself in a state of cheerfulness 
and tolerable content, and have a propensity to amuse myself with 
trifles. I hope I shall write something before I grow old, but I am 
not certain whether I am sufficiently industrious, 

I shall never apologise to you for egotism ; I think very few men, 
writing to their friends, have enough of it. If Horner were to break 
fifteen of his ribs, or marry, or resolve to settle in America, he 
would never mention it to his friends ; but would write with the 
most sincere kindness from Kentucky, to inquire for your welfare, 
leaving you to marvel as you chose at the post-mark, and to specu- 
late whether it was Kentucky or Kensington. 

I think very highly of " Waverley," and was inclined to suspect, 
in reading it, that it was written by Miss Scott of Ancram. 

I am truly glad to read of your pleasure from your little girl and 
your chateau. The haunts of Happiness are varied, and rather 
unaccountable ; but I have more often seen her among little chil- 
dren, and home firesides, and in country-houses, than anywhere 
else, — at least, I think so. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 






109.] To Lady Holland. 



February 1, 181 5. 



My dear Lady Holland, 

Many thanks for your letter. I think you very fortunate in 
having Rogers at Rome. Show me a more kind and friendly 
man ; secondly, one, from good manners, knowledge, fun, taste, and 
observation, more agreeable ; thirdly, a man of more strict political 
integrity, and of better character in private life. If I were to choose 
any Englishman in foreign parts whom I should wish to blunder 
upon, it should be Rogers. 

Lord paid a visit to a family whom he had not visited since 

the capture of the Bastille, and apologised for not having called 
before ; in the meantime, the estate had passed through two dif- 
ferent races. 

We have stayed at Castle Howard for two or three days. I 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 363 

found Lord Carlisle very good-natured, and even kind ; with con- 
siderable talents for society, a very good understanding, and no 
more visible consequence, as a nobleman, than he had a fair right 
to assume- Lady Carlisle seems thoroughly amiable. I soon 
found myself at my ease at Castle Howard, which will make an 
agreeable variety in my existence. Lord Morpeth and Lady 
Georgiana called upon us ; we have, in short, experienced very 
great civility from them. Lord and Lady Carlisle called upon us 
twice, and were overwhelmed in a ploughed field ! 

Sydney Smith. 



no.] To Lady Holland. 

Foston, 181 5. 
Dear Lady Holland, 

I thought you would have written me a line upon your first com- 
ing, but I thought also you were ill ; and as I get older, I make 
more and more allowance for the omnipotence of indolence, under 
whose dominion friend, lover, client, patron, satirist, and sycophant 
so often yield up their respective energies. 

I am not always confident of your friendship for me, at particular 
times ; but I have great confidence in it, from one end of the year 
to another : above all, I am confident that I have a great affection 
for you. 

I hear that Ward is in London. He follows you across Europe, 
and you him, but you never meet ; I suppose your mutual gratifi- 
cation is to be in the same city 5 — the purest and least sensual pas- 
sion I ever heard of, and such as I did not suppose to exist but in 
the books of knights-errant. 

Sydney Smith. 



hi.] To Lady Holland. 

No date: about 181 5. 

I hope the Lady Holland finds herself well, and brings with her 
a gay and healthy train ; — that all are well, from Cleopatra the 
queen to Antonio the page. 

Though I have no great affection for poverty at any time, it is on 
such occasions as these that I owe it the greatest grudge. If I were 
a Dean, I certainly would congratulate you in person, and not by 
letter. I missed you all very much in my last visit to London, 
which in other respects was a very agreeable one. 



364 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

I will not say a word about politics, or make the slightest allu- 
sion to a small rocky island in the middle of the Atlantic, the final 
cause of which now seems to be a little clearer ; but I may say he 
gives up too soon, — his resistances are not sufficiently desperate. 
I may say also, that I admire him for not killing himself, which is, 
in a soldier, easy, vulgar, and commonly foolish ; it shows that he 
has a strong tendency to hope, or that he has a confidence in his 
own versatility of character, and his means of making himself 
happy by trifling, or by intellectual exertion. 

Now pray do settle in England, and remain quiet ; depend upon 
it, it is the most agreeable place. I have heard five hundred tra- 
velled people assert that there is no such agreeable house in Europe 
as Holland House : why should you be the last person to be con- 
vinced of this, and the first to make it true ? 

Affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



112.] To Lord Holland. 

1815. 
My dear Lord Holland, 

I am totally unacquainted with the two tutors I recommended to 

B , but they were recommended to me from a quarter in which 

I could perfectly confide. My desiderata were, that they should 
possess a good deal of knowledge, and that they should be virtuous 
and good-tempered men. B 's son I understood to be an ordi- 
nary young man, and not requiring a person of more than common 
judgment and dexterity ; and therefore as much was proved to 
me as I required to be proved before I recommended. I can 
satisfy you in the same particulars by the same inquiry ; but whether 
the individual asked for may possess the sense, firmness, and 

judgment necessary to manage such a clever boy as , I cannot 

determine, as I have not sufficient confidence, upon points of this 
nature, in the person to whom my questions are addressed. 

If the Universities were well sifted and swept for you, the best 
person to get would be a Cambridge-man, or, at least, some man 
from an English university ; but then he would require a great deal 
of attention, would be troublesome from the jealousy of being 
slighted, and would be altogether an unpleasant inmate. I there- 
fore put Englishmen out of the question. All things considered, 
they would not do for you. I look upon Switzerland as an inferior 
sort of Scotland, and am for a Scotchman. A Scotchman full of 
knowledge, quiet, humble, assiduous, civil and virtuous, you will 
easily get ; and I will send you such a one per coach, or (which he 
will like better) per waggon, any day ; but will he command the 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 365 

respect of ? Will he acquire an ascendancy over him ? Will 

he be a man of good sound sense and firmness ? Here I cannot help 
you, because I know nobody myself; and, in a recommendation 
I should have so much at heart, I should choose to judge for 
myself. 

I do not know the name of the ex-tutor, or where he is ; but will 
write to-night, inquire every particular, state generally what is 
wanted, without mentioning names, and send you the answer. 

It will be hardly possible for you and Lady Holland to consent 
to such a plan ; but I should have thought that a tutor with three 
or four pupils, forty or fifty miles from London, would be the best 
arrangement. They abound, their characters are accessible, they 
are near, and among five hundred schoolmasters it may not be 
impossible to find a man of sense. But perhaps health would be 
an objection to this ; though I must observe that the health of very 
delicate children very often improves, in proportion as they are 
removed from the perilous kindness of home. 

Mr always seemed to me an excellent and accomplished, 

but a very foolish, man. There is very little mother-wit in the 
world, but a great deal of clergy. 

I remain always, my dear Lord Holland, with the most sincere 
attachment and affection, 

Sydney Smith. 



113.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Bath, 1 8 16. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I have a fancy to know how you do, and what has befallen you 
since your journey to Foston. I write this from Bath, where I am 
living, on a visit to my father. I shall not be in London before 
the month of May ; have I any chance of seeing you there ? 

Lord and Lady Byron are, you know, separated. He said to 
Rogers, that Lady Byron had parted with him, apparently in good 
friendship, on a visit to her father, and that he had no idea of their 
being about to part, when he received her decision to that effect. 
He stated that his own temper, naturally bad, had been rendered 
more irritable by the derangement of his fortune — and that Lady 
Byron was entirely blameless. The truth is, he is a very un- 
principled fellow. 

Leach will be Chancellor : I had heard last year that he was 
strongly solicited, by that bribe, to desert his party, and at last I 

see his virtue has given way. I have heard nothing of 's 

success; but what success can any man obtain,— on what side 



366 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

(Ireland excepted^ can the Administration be assailed with any- 
chance of success ? 

Madame de Stael is at Pisa, attending Rocca, who is dying. 
Have you read Stewart's preliminary dissertation ? What do you 
think of it? He is an excellent man. How does Brown's new 
poem turn out ? 

I beg, my dear Jeffrey, you will not class me amongst the tribe 
of irritable correspondents ; unless I write to you upon points of 
business, I hold it to be perfectly fair for you to answer me or not, 
and that you may keep the most profound silence, "salva amicitia," 
but it always gives me sincere pleasure to hear from you. I shall 
be here till about the 20th. Pray remember me very kindly to 
Murray and all friends. 

Sydney Smith. 



114.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, 1 8 16. 
Dear Jeffrey, 

I should have set off this day for Lord Grey and you, but Douglas 
tvas seized with typhus fever, and Mrs Sydney hurried up to Lon- 
don. He is much better, and will do well if there is no relapse ; 
in the meantime, I am prisoner here, because I must be jailer to 
my three remaining children. I was a good deal surprised to see 
in the " Times " a part of my review on the Abbe Georgel quoted 
before the Review is published ; is this quite right on the part of 
Constable ? I am truly sorry to lose my visit to you, and the more 
so, because I know you are not quite well. Pray say how that is, 
and promise me amendment in this respect. 

I have two short reviews to write of two French books, — Madame 
d'Epinay and Madame de Genlis, and then I am at a loss for a sub- 
ject. The trial of Home I relinquished on account of the invincible 
candour of my nature. Pray answer all my queries distinctly ; and 
how happy should I be if you would dictate your letters, and not 
write them yourself ! I can scarcely ever read them. 

I have just now received your letter, and am truly afflicted to re- 
ceive so melancholy an account of your health : and the more so, 
as I had not a suspicion, before Murray's letter, that you were at 
all ill. For God's sake be wise and obedient and meek to your 
bloody butchers, and let me hear from you very soon. I have a 
letter from Mrs Sydney this morning ; Douglas very weak, and I 
hardly think will remain in London. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 367 

115.] To Lady Holland. 

February 2, 18 16. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
My father seems to bear his great misfortune with equanimity. 
He is as well as he was fifteen years ago, and as young, at the 
nominal age of seventy-six. My sister was a most amiable and en- 
lightened woman : she had run through all the stamina of constitu- 
tion nature had allotted her, and died of old age, in youth. The 
loss of a person whom I would have cultivated as a friend, if nature 
had not given her to me as a relation, is a serious evil. 

I thank you most sincerely for your very handsome and delight- 
ful present, of Madame de Se'vigne, which will beguile many a York- 
shire hour. 

Sydney Smith. 



116.] To Lord Holland. 

August, 18 16. 
Dear Lord Holland, 
I can buy you some sheep by means of the agent I employ for 
myself ; but, then, there is a history to tell. I live only " from 
hand to mouth" (as the common people say), and for weeks to- 
gether I am not master of ten pounds, nor do I know where to get 
as much ; therefore you must give me a power of drawing on your 
bankers for any sum not exceeding ninety pounds, which will more 
than cover every possible expense, though I hope they will be bought 
much more advantageously. You will, I am sure, excuse my frank- 
ness ; but it may very possibly happen, when the time comes for 
buying the sheep, that I may be entirely without money. I will write 
to Johnson ; but I think the better way would be to send them at 
once to Holland House. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



117.] To the Countess Grey. 

York, Nov. 3, 1 8 16. 
If you and Lord Grey will consider yourselves as solemnly 
pledged to me not to reveal the contents of the enclosed note, open 
it, and you will read a marriage which will make you laugh. If 
you cannot give that pledge, fling it into the fire. I am quite serious 
in exacting the pledge, and as serious in assuring you, dear Lady 
Grey, of my great regard and respect. 

Sydney Smith. 
{Enclosed Note.] 
Sorry to treat with apparent harshness one whom I so much re- 



368 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

spcct, but cannot grant your Ladyship the slightest indulgence. On 
the contrary, must prohibit, in the severest manner, the disclosure 
of the secret, either to aliens or your own blood. 

Though necessity compels me to this rigour, I feel for your situa- 
tion, and am not without fears for your health ; you should avoid 
meat and wine, and live with the greatest care, till relief can be 
gained by disclosure. I assure you that the information is no joke 
on my part. I sincerely believe it myself, for it comes to me from 
a source that I must consider to be unquestionable. I remain, dear 
Lady Grey, most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



i i 8.] To Lady Holland. 

November 8, 1816. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I found and left Lord Grey in very good health. He is extremely 
pleased with the match, and most probably rightly pleased. We 

had, at Howick, Sir : — , with whom I was much taken ; 

quick, shrewd, original, well-informed, eccentric, paradoxical, and 
contradictory. 

It is not possible to speak of Horner ! I have a most sincere 
affection for him. 

I found everywhere in Northumberland and Scotland wretched 
crops, failing tenants, and distressed landlords (unlike Atlas), 
bending down with the weight of land suddenly flung upon their 
shoulders. 

Lord Morpeth called here the other day. I esteem myself most 
fortunate in being near so excellent and enlightened a man, and 
will cultivate him as much as he will let me. I am concerned to 
hear of Lord Holland's gout. I observe that gout loves ancestors 
and genealogy ; it needs five or six generations of gentlemen or 
noblemen to give it its full vigour. Allen deserves the gout more 
than Lord Holland. I have seen the latter personage resorting 
occasionally to plain dishes, but Allen passionately loves complexity 
and artifice in his food. 

I suppose Samuel Rogers it mortgaged to your Ladyship for the 
autumn and the early part of the winter. Perhaps you would have 

the goodness to say, that Miss thinks him charming ! Next 

to the Congreve rocket, he is the most mischievous and powerful 
of modern inventions. 

I have now read three volumes of Madame de Sevigne, with a 
conviction that her letters are very much over-praised. Mr Thomas 
Grenville says he has made seven vigorous attacks upon Madame 
de Sevigne, and has been as often repulsed. I presume you have 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 369 

read " Rhoda ; " if not, read it, at my peril. I was pestered into 
reading it, and felt myself very much obliged to my persecutors. 

1 think of my visit to Holland House last summer with the 
greatest pleasure, and hope to renew it again this year, if I am rich 
enough. I promise to be agreeable. 

Always your grateful and affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



119.] To Lady Holland. 

Foston, Nov. 16, 18 16. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
I am as sensible of the advantages of bringing my children to 
London as any one can be. I like to be there myself, and nobody 
enjoys more sincerely the society of friends ; but the duties of 
economy are paramount. Such slender means as mine admit of 
no imprudence and no excess. 

Yours, dear Lady Holland, most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



120.] To Francis Horner, Esq. 

Foston, Nov. 25, 18 16. 
My dear Horner, 

Since I saw you, I have paid a visit to Lord Grey. I met there 
Lambton, the about-to-be son-in-law ; a clever person. To him 

and Sir , and Sir , with whom I was very much 

pleased. I have seldom seen a more original or a quicker man ; 
eccentric, and affecting to be more so than he is, as is the case 
commonly with eccentric persons. From Lord Grey's I went to 

visit , whom I found unchanged, except that they are become 

a little more Methodistical. I endeavour in vain to give them more 
cheerful ideas of religion ; to teach them that God is not a jealous, 
childish, merciless tyrant ; that he is best served by a regular tenor 
of good actions, — not by bad singing, ill-composed prayers, and 
eternal apprehensions. But the luxury of false religion is, to be 
unhappy ! 

I went in quest of schools for Douglas. At Ripon I found an 
insignificant man, in melancholy premises, and boys two in a bed. 
At Richmond I was extremely pleased with Mr Tate, who takes 
thirty boys, and appears to be a very enlightened man. West- 
minster costs about ^150 or ^200 per annum. I have little to do, 
and am extremely poor. Why not keep Douglas at home till he is 

2 A 



370 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

sixteen, send him for three years to Mr Tate, then to Cambridge ? 
I cannot think that his moral or literary improvement will be less ; 
at the same time, if it were my duty to make the sacrifice, of course, 
/ would make it. but, after all the attention 1 can give to it, I 
cannot discover a better plan, even if I had ,£10,000 per annum ; 
of course it is taken for granted that I am able to teach him well, 
and that I shall stick to my duty.* 

It gives us the greatest pleasure to find you have got so far so 
well. Our kindest affections and warmest good wishes move on 
with you, and hang like a dew on the glasses of your carriage. 
God bless you, my dear Horner ! 

Sydney Smith. 



121.] To Francis Horner, Esq. 

Foston, 1816. 
My dear Horner, 

We are tolerably well pleased with the account you give of your- 
self. It would have been unreasonable to expect that you could 
gain anything during the fatigue of travelling ; it is much that you 
have not lost. Now is your beginning ! I hope you will have the 
resolution to withstand the importunities of friends, and hermeti- 
cally to seal yourself. Dear little F A has the best heart 

in the world, but you must not let her excite you to much talking. 
If were at Pisa, you would of course order horses. 

I have just read Dugald Stewart's " Preliminary Dissertations." 
In the first place 3 it is totally clear of all his defects. No insane 
dread of misrepresentation ; no discussion put off till another time, 
just at the moment it was expected, and would have been interest- 
ing ; no unmanly timidity ; less formality of style and cathedral 
pomp of sentence. The good, it would be trite to enumerate : — 
the love of human happiness and virtue, the ardour for the extension 
of knowledge, the command of fine language, happiness of allusion, 
varied and pleasing literature, tact, wisdom, and moderation ! 
Without these high qualities, we all know Stewart cannot write. 
I suspect he has misrepresented Home Tooke, and his silence 
respecting Hartley is very censurable. I was amazingly pleased 
with his comparison of the Universities to enormous hulks confined 
with mooring-chains, everything flowing and progressing around 
them. Nothing can be more happy. 

I speak of books as I read them, and I read them as I can get 
them. You are read up to twelve o'clock of the preceding day, 
and therefore must pardon the staleness of my subjects. I read 
yesterday the evidence of the Elgin Marble Committee. Lord 

* Mr Horner was Douglas's godfather. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 371 

Elgin has done a very useful thing in taking them away from the 
Turks. Do not throw pearls to swine j and take them away from 
swine when they are so thrown. They would have been destroyed 
there, or the French would have had them. He is underpaid for 
them. Flaxman's evidence (some little ostentation excepted) is 
very ingenious. Payne Knight makes a very poor figure ; — un- 
shaken confidence, upon the most scanty foundations. 

We are all perfectly well. Corn is rather bad than dear, but makes 
good unleavened bread ; and the poor, I find, seldom make any 
other than unleavened bread, even in the best seasons. I have 
seen nobody, and heard from nobody, since I last wrote. Seven 
years' absence from London is too severe a trial for correspondents. 
Even Astrea Whishaw has given way. 

I remain always your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



122.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Sedgeley, Jan. 6, 181 7. 
Dear Lady Mary Bennett, 

I think it was rather bad taste on my part to speak of the Prin- 
cess as a royal person, when you were lamenting her loss as an 
acquaintance ; but I am very jealous of the monarchical feelings of 
this country. 

I do not know whether you are acquainted with the Philips with 
whom I am now staying ; he is very rich, the discoverer of cotton, 
and an old friend of mine. I am going to preach a charity sermon 
next Sunday. I desire to make three or four hundred weavers cry, 
which it is impossible to do since the late rise in cottons. 

And now, dear Lady Mary, do you want anything in the flowered 
cotton, or Manchester velvet, or chintz line ? Remember, this is 
not a town where there are only a few shops, but it is the great 
magazine from which flow all the mercers' shops in the known world. 
Here tabbies and tabinets are first concocted ! Here muslin — 
elementary, rudimental, early, primeval muslin — is meditated ; 
broad and narrow sarsnet first see the light, and narrow and broad 
edging ! Avail yourself, dear lady, of my being here to prepare 
your conquering armour for your next campaign. 

I shall be in town by the end of march, and shall have real 
pleasure in seeing you. I think you begin to feel at ease in my 
company : certainly, you were much improved in that particular the 
last time we met. God bless you ! I admire you very much, and 

praise you often. 

Sydney Smith. 



372 LETTERS OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 

123.] To Lord Holland. 

March 13, 181 7. 
My dear Lord Holland, 
Nobody, I assure you, is more desirous of living at ease than I 
am ; but I should prefer the approbation of such men as the Duke 
of Bedford and yourself, to the most unwieldy bishopric obtained 
by means you would condemn and despise. Doubtless, when you 
think of that amorous and herbivorous parish of Covent Garden, 
and compare it with my agricultural benefice, you will say, " Better 
is the dinner of herbs where love is, than the stalled ox," &c. &c. 
Be this as it may, my best thanks are due to you for your kind 
exertions in my favour ; but you and Lady Holland are full of kind- 
ness to me on all occasions : you know how sincerely I am attached 
to you both. 

I entirely agree to, and sympathise with, your opposition to the 
suspension : nothing can be more childish and more mischievous. 
Christianity in danger of being written down by doggrel rhymes ! 
England about to be divided into little parcels, like a chess-board ! 
The flower and chivalry of the realm flying before one armed 
apothecary ! 

How can old Mother G and Mother F swallow such 

trash as this ? 

I say nothing of the great and miserable loss we have all sus- 
tained. He will always live in our recollection ; and it will be 
useful to us all, in the great occasions of life, to reflect how 
Horner would act and think in them, if God had prolonged his 
life. 

Ever, my dear Lord Holland, most truly and affectionately 
yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



124.] To John Whishaw, Esq. 

My dear Whishaw, 



March 26, 181 7. 



It will give us the most sincere pleasure to see you here, if it is 
in your power to reach us. Let us detain you (if you do come) as 
long as your other avocations will permit. 

I am not without hopes of being in town, but do not like leaving 
the country without collecting the little rents that are due to me ; 
indeed, if I omitted that ceremony before leaving my friends, I most 
probably should never see them again. Lord Holland has told you 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 373 

the danger I was exposed to, of becoming rector of Covent Garden, 
of hortcscortical notoriety. I think this is placing a clergyman in 
the van of the battle. 

I had a letter yesterday from Philips ; he begins to tremble for 
Manchester. In this part of the country, there is not the slightest 
degree of distress among the poor. Everybody is employed, and at 
fair wages ; but we are purely agricultural. I was surprised to find 
Bobus among the anti-alarmists ; he does not always keep such 
good company. 

We saw Jeffrey on his way down. I should be glad to know 
whether he made a good figure in the House of Lords, and pro- 
duced any effect. I had not seen him for some time, and found 
him improved in manner ; in essentials he cannot improve. 
Ever, dear Whishaw, most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



125.] To George Philips, Esq., M.P. 

Foston, July 25, 1817. 
My dear Philips, 

Your letter gave Mrs Sydney and me great pleasure. Once out 
of London you will rapidly recover ; — and here, my dear Philips, 
let me warn you against the melancholy effects of temperance. 
You will do me the justice to remember how often I have entered 
my protest against it : depend upon it, the wretchedness of human 
life is only to be encountered upon the basis of meat and wine. 

Poor Ponsonby is numbered with the just. I had a letter last 
week from Lord Grey, lamenting his loss in very feeling terms. 

Brougham is here, that is, at York. Scarlett is detained in town, 
and does not come for the first week. I hope you are pleased 

with the spirit of the magistrates. Lord has lived long among 

them, and they knew him to be a fool ; this is a great advantage. 
At this distance from London no magistrate believes that a 
Secretary of State can be a fool. I am much pleased with the St 
Helena manuscript, — it seems smartly written, and full of good 
sense ; it is a very good imitation of what Buonaparte might have 
said. 

It will give us great pleasure to come to you this year. I hope 
nothing will happen to prevent it ; though it commonly happens, 
when a person is just going to set out for any place where he 
wishes to go, that he falls down and breaks his leg in two places ; 
or, having arrived, is seized with a scarlet fever ; or is forced to 
return, hearing that his son's eye is knocked out by a cricket-ball. 

I sincerely hope, my dear Philips, that you are recovering your 
strength rapidly, and that, in the enjoyment of your pretty place, 



374 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

you will forget your past severe sufferings. Ever your sincere 
friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



126.] To Lady Holland. 



Julyii, 181 7. 



My dear Lady Holland, 
I write to you from Scarborough, with a clear view of the Hague 
and Amsterdam. 

It is very curious to consider in what manner Horner gained, in 
so extraordinary a degree, the affections of such a number of 
persons of both sexes, — all ages, parties, and ranks in society ; for 
he was not remarkably good-tempered, nor particularly lively and 
agreeable ; and an inflexible politician on the unpopular side. The 
causes are, his high character for probity, honour, and talents ; his 
line countenance ; the benevolent interest he took in the concerns 
of all his friends ; his simple and gentlemanlike manners ; his un- 
timely death. 

Sydney Smith. 



127.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

Scarborough^ August 15, 1817. 
My dear Sir, 
I received your note at Scarborough, where I am with my brother, 
his family, and my father. From this place they all go to my house 

at Foston, and there they must be packed by 's condensing 

machine. Under these circumstances, it will be quite impossible 
to enjoy the pleasure of your company. Some other time I hope I 
shall be more fortunate. I am truly obliged to you for your friendly 
intention and recollection of my invitation. 

Our friend Philips is getting much better, and is making very 
laudable resolutions of intemperance, having been very much 
blamed by Baillie for his abstemious habits. 

I remain, dear Davenport, sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



128.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Foston, York, Oct. 3, 181 7. 
My dear Murray, 
Nothing can be more unjust and natural than the conduct of 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 375 

parents in placing their children. They have recourse to ten 
thousand advisers, and appeal to each as if their whole confidence 

were placed in him. Somebody has now advised Mr B that 

Mr is the best tutor in Edinburgh ; and to Mr , I 

presume, his son will go. I am extremely sorry for all the trouble 
I have given you, but as my residence in Scotland is so well known, 
appeals to me are made from intimate friends ; and what can I do ? 
The same thing may happen to you about English schools, and 
then you may take your revenge upon me. 

If ever you find yourself in an idle mood, I wish you would send 
me an accurate account of what is done in the High School at 
Edinburgh. Jeffrey descanted upon that subject : but with all my 
love and respect for him, I find it quite impossible to believe, 
though I acquitted him, of course, of any intentional misrepresent- 
ation ; but every young gentleman of twelve years of age appeared 
far superior to Henry Stephens or his footman Scapula. 

Jeffrey has thrashed happily and deservedly ; — but is it not 

time now to lay up his cudgel ? Heads that are plastered and 
trepanned all over are no longer fit for breaking. 

M , I see, retires from his present situation, to sit in judg- 
ment upon the lives and properties of his fellow-creatures. When 
a man is a fool, in England we only trust him with the immortal 
concerns of human beings. 

Believe me, ever most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



129.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Foston, November i 181 7. 
Dear Lady Mary, 

I have not written to you, because I have been very busy ; but I 
always felt that I ought, and that I wished, to write to you. 

We pressed to stay longer, but she is a great politician, 

and has some myterious reasons for returning, which I could not 
fathom, though I let down my deep-sea line ; probably they are 
connected with the present precarious state of the Bourbons, and 
the lingering and protracted war carried on in the Spanish colonies. 
The natives admired her eyes very much, and said they were very 
different from Yorkshire eyes. They indeed express every soft and 
amiable virtue, with just as much of wickedness as is necessary to 
prevent insipidity. 

I ought to apologise to you for not having said anything of the 
Princess. Youth and fertility quenched by death is a melancholy 
event, let the rank of the victim be what it may ; but her death is 



376 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

not of any political importance; the root remains deep in the 
earth, and it matters not which becomes the leading shoot. 

I shall bring up your friend Douglas to Westminster after 
Easter, when I hope, my dear little friend, to see you in town. I 
shall have a mean idea of your powers, if, between coaxing, scold- 
ing, plaguing, and reasoning, you cannot make Lord Tankerville 
take a house. 

I always tell you all the books worth notice that I read, and I 
rather counsel you to read Jacob's " Spain," a book with some 
good sense in it, and not unentertaining ; also, by all means, the 
first volume of Franklin's Letters. I will disinherit you if you do 
not admire everything written by Franklin. In addition to all other 
good qualities, he was thoroughly honest. 

We have had Sir Humphry Davy here. A spurious Aladdin 
has sprung up in Northumberland, and pretends that the magical 
lamp belongs to him. There is no end to human presumption and 
arrogance, — though nobody has as yet pretended to be Lady Mary 
Bennett. 

Sydney Smith. 



130.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Fostou, 1 817. 
Dear Lady Mary, 

There never was better venison, or venison treated with more 
respect and attention. Chillingham is a place of the greatest 
merit. 

I envy Brougham his trip to Paris. There is nothing (except 
the pleasure of seeing you) I long for so much as to see Paris, and 
I pray my life may be spared for this great purpose, or rather these 
great purposes. Easter will do for the first, as I shall be in town 
about that time. My brother and his family quit us on Monday 
for Bowood. A house emptied of its guests is always melancholy 
for the first three or four days. Their loss will be supplied by Sir 
Humphry and Lady Davy, who are about to pay us a visit next 
week. 

I have not framed your drawing yet, because I want another to 
accompany it, and then they shall both go up together. I do not 
know whether this is exigeant or not ; but I have so great an idea 
of your fertility in these matters, that I consider a drawing to be no 
more to you than an epic poem to Coleridge, or a prison and police 
bill to some of your relations. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 377 

131.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

No date. 
My dear Friend, 

I sent you hasty notice, two or three days ago, that your pretty 
and elegant drawings had arrived. They are hung up, and give 
me a ray of cheerfulness and satisfaction whenever I look upon 
them. 

Lord Tankerville is very kind to me, and I am much flattered by 
his attention. I will write to Mr Bailey on the very interesting 
subject of venison, — a subject which is deemed amongst the clergy 
a professional one. 

I hardly know any man who deserves any woman ; therefore I 

shall think unequally married if she marries . It is a 

common, every-day sort of match ; and she will be occupied, as 
usual, by the rapid succession of Tom, Peter, Harry, Susan, 
Daniel, Caroline, Elizabeth, Jemima, Duodecimus, and Tridecimus. 

There is a great difference of opinion about Scott's new novel. 
At Holland House it is much run down ; I dare not oppose my 
opinion to such an assay or proof-house ; but it made me cry and 
laugh very often, and I was very sorry when it was over, and so I 
cannot in justice call it dull. 

The few words I said of Mrs Fry (whom God bless, as well as 
you !) were these : — 

" There is a spectacle which this town now exhibits, that I will 
venture to call the most solemn, the most Christian, the most 
affecting, which any human being ever witnessed ! To see that 
holy woman in the midst of wretched prisoners, — to see them 
calling earnestly upon God, soothed by her voice, animated by her 
look, clinging to the hem of her garment, and worshipping her as the 
only human being who has ever loved them, or taught them, or 
noticed them, or spoken to them of God ! — this is the sight which 
breaks down the pageantry of the world, — which tell us that the 
short hour of life is passing away, and that we must prepare by 
some good deeds to meet God ; that it is time to give, to pray, to 
comfort, — to go, like this blessed woman, and do the work of our 
heavenly Saviour, Jesus, among the guilty, among the broken- 
hearted, and the sick ; and to labour in the deepest and darkest 
wretchedness of life !" God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



132.] To the Countess Grey. 

December 22, 181 7. 
Dear Lady Grey, 
I am afraid you will laugh the flower-garden to scorn ; and yet 



378 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

the living pattern is the prettiest thing of the kind I ever saw. I 
cannot see why you should disdain formal and regular shapes. 
In small spaces of ground contiguous to your house, and with the 
blooming midsummer blaze of flowers, they are surely very pretty. 
And in this mode were these gardens first brought over to us from 
Holland and France. 

I journeyed on to York with very little ennui. As long as the 
coach is in Northumberland, I think the conversation turns upon 
the Duke of Northumberland and Lord Grey. A fat lady in the 
corner was very partial to the latter : a merchant from Newcastle 
did not like his principles ; — " All the Greys are passionate, but it 
is soon over ;" " Sir Harry shot an eagle ;" " Lord Grey can spend 
thirty thousand a year, clear/' &c. &c. 

I found everybody very well at my home, and various schemes 
laid for Christmas feasts, in which, as you may suppose, I shall be 
aiding and abetting. I am very much obliged to you and Lord 
Grey for your kindness during my stay with you. Amid your 
lords and dukes, pray keep a bit, however small, in your recollection 
for me. 

God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! Ever, with sincere respect and 
regard, yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



133.] To John Whishaw, Esq. 

January 7, 181 8. 
My dear Whishaw, 

We have been here* for a fortnight, and stay till the 21st. The 
company who come here are chiefly philosophical, as there is an 
immense colony of that name in these parts ; they seem all good- 
natured, worthy people, and many of them in the Whig line. In 
these days, too, everybody reads a little ; and there is more variety 
and information in every class than there was fifty years ago. 
About the year 1740, a manufacturer of long ells or twilled fustians 
must have been rather a coarse-grained fellow. It is not among 
gentlemen of that description I would at present look for all that 
is delightful in manner and conversation, but they certainly run 
finer than they did, and are (to use their own phrase) a superior 
article. 

The acquittal of Hone gave me sincere pleasure, because I 
believe it proceeded, in some measure, from the horror and disgust 
which the excessive punishments for libel have excited; and if 
jurymen take this mode of expressing their disgust, judges will be 
more moderate. It is a rebuke also upon the very offensive and 

* The name of the place is not given in the MS.— Ed 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 379 

scandalous zeal of , and teaches juries their strength and 

importance. In short, Church and King in moderation are very 
good things, but we have too much of both. I presume by this 
time your grief at the death of the Princess is somewhat abated. 
Death in the midst of youth is always melancholy, but I cannot 
think it of political importance. 

I am very glad the have sent their son from home ; he is a 

very unusual boy, and he wanted to be exposed a little more to the 
open air of the world. 

Poor Mackintosh ! I am heartily sorry for him ; but his situation 
at Hertford will suit him very well (pelting and contusions always 
excepted*). He should stipulate for "pebble money," as it is 
technically termed, or an annual pension in case he is disabled by 
the pelting of the students. By the by, might it not be advisable 
for the professors to learn the use of the sling (balearis habena) ? — 
it would give them a great advantage over the students. 

We are all perfectly well, with the usual January exceptions of 
colds, sore throats, rheumatism, and hoarseness. I shall be in 
London in March, but pray write to me before if you have any 
leisure. 

Ever your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



134.] To Lady Holland. 

February 6, 1818. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
I cannot be insensible to the loss of so sensible and so agreeable 
a man as Lord Ossory, and of one so nearly related to Lord 
Holland ; but I know nothing which, for a long time, has made 
me so truly happy as to hear of your accession of fortune, which I 
did this day from Lord Carlisle. I gave three loud huzzas in Lord 
Cawdor's dressing-room : making more noise in a minute than the 
accumulated sounds in Castle Howard would amount to in a whole 
year. God send you health and long life, to enjoy it ! 

Sydney Smith. 



135.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Foston, February , 18 18. 
Dear Lady Mary, 
I have, for many weighty reasons, put off my coming to town till 

* Alluding to the frequent insurrections that used formerly to take place amongst the 
students at Haileybury College. 



jSo LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

the middle of May ; therefore, pray do not destroy yourself with 
dissipation between this period and that, so that there may remain 
a small portion of you for your lately-arriving country friends. 

I never knew anything more horrible than the death of poor 
Croft ; what misery the poor fellow must have suffered between the 
Princess's death and his own ! 

I hope you are as much rejoiced as it behoves all good people to 
be, at the increase of fortune which has accrued to Lord Holland. 
Lord Ossory seems to have enjoyed as much happiness as falls to 
the lot of human beings, — a good fortune, rank, excellent sense and 
health, a love of knowledge, long life, and equable temper. May 
all this be your lot ! 

You said there was a young to appear soon ; where is it ? 

What do you think of Publicola Pym Hampden Runnymede , 

for a name ? 

I am losing my life and time in thinking and talking of bulls, 
cows, horses, and sheep ; and, with my time, my money also. God 
bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



136.] To Lady Davy. 

Foston, April % 1818. 
My dear Lady Davy, 

Infinitely gratified, that you, who live in the most intellectual 
spot of the most intellectual place in the world, should think and 
ask when a Yorkshire parson comes to town. My Lord, the Thane 
of Cawdor, is pleased to disport himself sometimes with the 
country clergy ; yet, by the grace of God, they will be equal with 
him when they come to London. 

I am astonished that a woman of your sense should yield to such 
an imposture as the Augsburg Alps ; — surely you have found out, 
by this time, that God has made nothing so curious as human 
creatures. Deucalion and Pyrrha acted with more wisdom than 
Sir Humphry and you ; for being in the Augsburg Alps, and meet- 
ing with a number of specimens, they tossed them over their heads 
and turned them into men and women. You, on the contrary, are 
flinging away your animated beings for quartz and feldspar. 

The Hollands wrote with great pleasure of a dinner you gave 
them : and certainly you do keep o?ie of the most agreeable houses, 
if not the most agreeable house, in London. AH Pasha Luttrell, 
Prince of the Albanians, allows this. 

I am impatient to see you, and am always pleased and flattered 
when I find the Lethean lemonade of London does not banish me 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 381 

from your recollections. Mrs Sydney unites with me in kind 
regards to Sir Humphry. 

Ever, dear Lady Davy, most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



137.] To John Whishaw, Esq. 

Foston, April 13, 18 18. 
My dear Whishaw, 

I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer ; I have how- 
ever made numerous inquiries, and believe I am tolerably well 
instructed in the ways of Westminster School. If any of your 
friends have a son at Westminister, who is a boy of conduct and 
parts, I should be much obliged to you to recommend Douglas* 
to his protection ; he has never been at school, and the change is 
greater perhaps than any other he will experience in his future 
life. 

My astonishment was very great at reading Canning's challenge 
to the anonymous pamphleteer. If it were the first proof of the 
kind, it would be sufficient to create a general distrust of his 
sense, prudence, and capacity for action. What sympathy can a 
wit by profession, a provoker and a discoverer of other men's 
weaknesses, expect for his literary woes ? What does a politician 
know of his trade, when twenty years have not made him pamphlet- 
proof ? I cannot form a guess who has written a pamphlet that 
could provoke Canning to such a reply : I should scarcely suppose 
any producible person ; but I have not read it, and am therefore 
talking at random. 

Our excellent friend appears to have been somewhat hasty 

upon the subject of the spy in the one-horse chair, drawn by the 
warrior ; but his conduct was very manly and respectable, in 
advocating the cause of the poor democrats, who by their knavery 
and folly are very contemptible, but are not therefore to be aban- 
doned to their oppressors. I have been fighting up against agri- 
cultural difficulties, and endeavouring to do well what I am com- 
pelled to do ; but I believe the first receipt to farm well is, to be 
rich. 

Soon after the 12th of May I hope to see you, and shall be happy 
to converse with you upon the subject of our poor friend's papers ; 
though the general leaning of my mind is to leave his fame where 
it now stands, upon its political base. 

Hertford College is really a paradox. 

Of Hallam's labour and accuracy I have no doubt : I like and 

* Mr Smith's eldest son. 



382 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

respect him as much as you do ; his success will please me very 
much. 

I remain, my dear Whishaw, very truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



138.] To Lady Davy. 

[Note.] Holland House. 

You are of an ardent mind, and overlook the difficulties and 
embarrassments of life. Luttrell, before I taught him better, 
imagined muffins grew ! He was wholly ignorant of all the inter- 
mediate processes of sowing, reaping, grinding, kneading, and 
baking. Now you require a.ftro?nfit answer; but mark the diffi- 
culties : your note comes to Weymouth Street, where I am not; 
then by the post to Holland House, where, as I am not a marquis, 
and have no servant, it is tossed on the porter's table ; and when 
found and answered, will creep into the post late this evening, if 
the postman is no more drunk than common. 

Pray allow for these distressing embarrassments, with which 
human intercourse is afflicted ; and believe how happy I shall be 
to wait on you the 22d, being always, my dear Lady Davy, sincerely 
yours, Sydney Smith. 



139.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

1818. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I am truly obliged by your kindness in inviting Mrs Sydney and 
me to come and see you. I know nothing that would give us 
more pleasure ; but poverty, agriculture, children, clerical confine- 
ment, all conspire to put such a pleasure out of my reach. The 
only holiday I get in the year carries me naturally towards London, 
to meet my father and brother ; however, I will not despair. I 
mention these things explicitly now, that there may be no occasion 
to trouble you any more ; and this, I dare say you will agree with 
me, is the better plan. 

I must however beg the favour of you to be explicit on one point. 
Do you mean to take care that the Review shall not profess or 
encourage infidel principles ? Unless this is the case, I must 
absolutely give up all thoughts of connecting myself with it. 

Is it the custom in the Review to translate French extracts ? I 
believe not. 

I have received, and nearly read, Georgel. 

Ever, my dear friend, yours affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 383 

140.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Foston, July 16, 181 8. 
My dear Allen, 

I have read Georgel, and must say I have seldom read a more 
stupid book. The first volume, in which he relates what he had 
seen and observed himself, is well enough ; but the three last are 
no more than a mere newspaper collection of the proceedings ; 
lamentations over the wickedness of the Revolution, and common 
parsonic notions of the right of kings. Does the book strike you 
in any other point of view ? Such as it is, I shall write a review of 
it, and I should be obliged to you to tell me if you think my opinion 
just. 

Is his explanation of the story of the necklace to be credited ? 
Could a man of the Cardinal's rank, who had filled the situation of 
Ambassador at the Court of Vienna, be the dupe of such a woman 
as Madame La Motte ? or was he the rogue ? or was he the dupe? 
and La Motte the agent of the Queen ? If this is not the true 
version, where is the true version to be found ? Is there any new 
information respecting the French Revolution in Georgel ? there 
seems none such to me. Pray recommend me some new books as 
soon as you can. Brougham seems to have made a very respect- 
able appearance in point of numbers. 

The springs and the fountains are all dried up, and the land and 
the cattle are drinking ale and porter. But nothing signifies when 
the Whigs are so successful. Kind regards. Ever yours, dear 
Allen, most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



141.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

August 1 81 8. 

The drawings, dear Lady, are not yet arrived, though I dare say 
they are on the road. We have one drawing of yours in our draw- 
ing-room, and shall be delighted to multiply such ornaments, for 
their own merit, and for the recollections they excite. 

My sermon is on the road, with other heavy baggage. I will 
read it when it comes ; and if what I have said of Mrs Fry is worth 
extracting, I shall be happy to send it to you : but I am a rough 
writer of sermons, thinking less care necessary for that which is 
spoken, than that which is written ; or rather, I should say, for 
that which is written to be spoken, than that which is written to be 
read. 

Poor Bobus has, as you see, lost his election ; a trick played 
upon him by that extraordinary person who looks over Lincoln, 



384 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

and who, looking, saw that he had not his clerical brother with 
him, and so watched his opportunity to do him a mischief. 

I am heartily glad to see the elections take so favourable a turn. 
The people are all mad ; what can they possibly mean by being so 
wise and so reasonable ? 

I recommend you to read the first and second volumes of the 
four volumes of the Abb6 Georgel's Memoirs. You will suppose, 
from this advice, that there is something improper in the third and 
fourth ; but, to spare you the trouble of beginning with them, I 
assure you I only exclude them from my recommendation because 
they are dull. You will see, in the second volume, a detailed 
account of the celebrated Necklace Story, which regaled your papa 
and mamma before you were born, — an event, by the by, for which 
I always feel myself much indebted to Lord and Lady Tankerville. 
God bless you ! Sydney Smith. 



142.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, August 9, 18 18. 
My dear Friend, 

I will tell you my opinion about Hone and his prosecution, and 
then you shall do just as you like in allotting the book to, or with- 
holding it from, me. 

I think the Administration did perfectly right in prosecuting 
him ; for he either intended to bring the religion of his country 
into ridicule with the common people, or was blamably careless in 
not guarding against that consequence ; but the punishments of 
libel are so atrocious and severe, that I almost doubt whether his 
total acquittal is not better than the establishment of his guilt 
would have been, followed by that enormous and disproportionate 
punishment which awaited it. Lord Ellenborough's conduct was 
very absurd; and it was tyrannical and oppressive to prosecute 
the man three times. I have the same opinion which everybody 
else has of the bravery and talent exemplified in his defence ; and 
his trial is rendered memorable by the improved method of striking 
a jury. 

These are the outlines of my opinions on the subject, and I shall 
most cheerfully acquiesce in your sentence of Yes or No. 

I had no idea of writing anything very new upon the subject of 
the Poor Laws, but something short and readable, which Chalmers 
has not done, for it is not possible to read his dissertation ; but 
there may be some fear of clashing with him, and therefore perhaps 
I had better avoid the subject. I would not, of course, interfere 
with any subject you intended to treat. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 385 

I will bore you as little with questions about the Review as pos- 
sible ; but do not think it necessary, in writing an answer, when 
you happen to be busy, to write more than a mere reply to the 
question. 

We are just beginning our harvest here, — a very indifferent one ; 
and water is not to be had for love or money. Ever, my dear 
Jeffrey, most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



143.] To the Earl Grey. 

York, August 24, 181 8. 
Dear Lord Grey, 

I am very desirous to hear what your vote is about Walter Scott. 
I think it excellent, — quite as good as any of his novels, excepting 
that in which Claverhouse is introduced, and of which I forget the 
name. I read it with the liveliest interest ; he repeats his char- 
acters, but it seems they will bear repetition. I have heard no 
votes, but those of Lord and Lady Holland and John Allen against, 
and Lord and Lady Lansdowne for, the book. 

I congratulate you on the general turn of the elections, and the 
serious accession of strength to the Whigs. 

Brougham seems to have made an excellent stand against the 
Lonsdales : and if Lord Thanet will back him again, he will pro- 
bably carry his point. The Tories here are by no means satisfied 

with , who is subjected to vacillations between right and 

wrong. They want a man steadily base, who may be depended 

upon for want of principle. I think on these points Mr might 

satisfy any reasonable man ; but they are exorbitant in their 
demands. 

We conquered here the whooping-cough with a pennyworth of 
salt of tartar, after having filled them with the expensive poisons 
of Halford. What an odd thing that such a specific should not be 
more known ! 

Adieu, my dear Lord ! Ever yours, with sincere attachment and 
respect, 

Sydney Smith. 

144.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Fostotiy August 28 , 1818. 
My dear Allen, 
I have long since despatched my review of Georgel to Jeffrey. 
It is ten years since there has been any account in the Edinburgh 
Review of Botany Bay ; I have a fancy to give an account of the 

2 B 



386 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

progress of the colony since that time ; do you know any books to 
have recourse to ? There is a Report of the House of Commons, 
which must throw some light on the present state of the colony, 
and there are, above all, if I could get at them, the Botany Bay 
and Van Diemen's Land newspapers. Do you know Mamie's 
book, 1811? Do you know anything else in any other books 
capable of throwing light upon the subject ? 

There is a Mr Stewart in Edinburgh, a Scotch clergyman, who 
is said to be eminently successful in the cure of phthisis when 
somewhat advanced ; have you heard anything about him, or his 
practice ? Do you believe in the report ? Will you write imme- 
diately to John Thompson, to know what is his opinion of Stewart 
and his practice ? The anecdotes I have heard are very numerous 
and very strong. 

The harvest is finished here, and is not more than two thirds of 
an average crop : potatoes have entirely failed ; there is no hay ; 
and it will be a year of great scarcity. 

I cannot at all agree about Walter Scott ; it is a novel full of 
power and interest ; he repeats his characters, but they will bear 
repetition. Who can read the novel without laughing and crying 
twenty times ? What other proof is needed ? 

Lord Tankerville has sent me a whole buck ; this necessarily 
takes up a good deal of my time. Lord Carlisle gets stronger and 
healthier every time I see him. Morpeth has arrived at Castle 
Howard with the Duke of Rutland. 

What matchless impudence, to place the two in the frontis- 
piece of the Education Committee ! 

Your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



145.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Eos t 'on, September 15, 1818. 
Dear Allen, 

I am exceedingly obliged by your kindness in procuring for me 
the Botany Bay Gazettes, but I have just received a letter from 
Longman, saying he shall be able to procure them ; as it is better 
therefore to employ one who has a pecuniary interest in being civil, 
than a person who has merely a moral interest, I hasten to save 
trouble to Mr Plumer, who probably after all is taking none ; but 
still, having said he would take trouble, the obligation is the same. 

Thompson * is above all jealousy, and therefore phthisis remains 
as incurable as it always has been ; still the day may come — will 
come when that complaint will be reduced to utter insignificance 

* Dr Thompson of Edinburgh. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 387 

by seme silly weed on which we now trample every day, not know- 
ing its power to prevent the greatest human afflictions. 

I should very much have liked a collection of letters of Madame 
d'Epinay and her friends, after her return from Geneva, and her 
friendship established with Diderot. Grimm is an excellent person, 
not unlike Whishaw, except as he is the object of a tender passion 
to a beautiful woman. 

I question much whether Lady Holland has seen a real country 
squire, or if they grow at all within that distance of London. 

Sydney Smith. 



146.] To the Earl Grey. 

September ; 181 8. 
My dear Lord Grey, 

Many thanks for the important information you have sent me, 

which I have forwarded to , whose children, I find, are better : 

but I hope he will not resume his security. I shall be very much 
surprised if it turns out that Stewart can stop the progress of 
ulcers found in the lungs ; but the project of hardening the lungs, 
by hardening their case, seems worth attending to. Most of the 
viscera can be got at, and improved by topical applications, — liver, 
stomach, kidneys, &c. 

I think I shall be able to make out a journey to the North this 
year. It will give me a sincere pleasure to come to Ho wick ; I 
have no doubt of a hearty welcome. The Duchess of Bedford is 
full of amusement and sense ; but I need no other motive to visit 
Howick than the sincere respect and friendship I entertain for its 
inhabitants, whose acquaintance I find myself to have made (so 
human life slips on !) eleven years ago. 

We have about two-thirds of a crop in this country, and I have 
a fine crop of Talavera wheat. The Granvilles are at Castle 
Howard, and all the Morpeths (no mean part of the population of 
Yorkshire) fully established there. The old Earl is young, athletic, 
and merry. 

You had better write to the Duke of N orfolk about the seats of 
our friends Philips and his son, as they will both probably be 
hanged by the mob in cotton twist. 

The Commissioner will have hard work with the Scotch atheists ; 
they are said to be numerous this season, and in great force, from 
the irregular supply of rain. 

I am by no means well this day, so I must leave off writing : I 
will write to you before I come, and hear from you before I set off. 
Ever, my dear Lord, most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith, 



388 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

147.J To Lady Holland. 

Foston, October 11, 181 8. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

Allen asked when Douglas and I come to the South ; but I had 
no thoughts of coming, and Douglas has been at Westminster some 
time, fought his first battle, come off victorious, and is completely 
established. Instead of the south, I am turning my face north- 
wards, to see Lord Grey and Jeffrey. John Murray and I are to 
meet at the best of all possible chateaux. 

Some surprise is excited by your staying at Ampthill ; but 
Rogers, I hear, has been sent for as a condiment, and Luttrell has 
been also in your epergne. 

I am sorry we cannot agree about Walter Scott. My test of a 
book written to amuse, is amusement ; but I am rather rash, and 
ought not to say / am amused, before I have inquired whether 
Sharp or Mackintosh is so. Whishaw's plan is the best : he gives 
no opinion for the first week, but confines himself to chuckling and 
elevating his chin ; in the meantime he drives diligently about the 
first critical stations, breakfasts in Mark Lane, hears from Hertford 
College, and by Saturday night is as bold as a lion, and as decisive 
as a court of justice. 

The are gone to , and superfine work there will be, and 

much whispering ; so that a blind man should sit there, and believe 
they are all gone to bed, though the room is full of the most 
brilliant company ! As for me, I like a little noise and nature, and 
a large party, very merry and happy. Yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



148.] To the Earl Grey. 

Foston, October 23, 181 8. 
My dear Lord Grey, 

Douglas is a great deal better, and if he has no relapse will do 
well. Mrs Sydney is in town nursing him by this time, though I 
have not yet heard accounts of her arrival. I am on guard here, 
with three children of my own and one of my neighbour's, in whose 
house (guided always by the most rigid rules of vaccination and 
Jenner) the natural small-pox has broken out, but without death or 
ugliness. 

I am heartily sorry not to make out my visit to Howick. It is 
not impossible, but very improbable. 

I have had a letter to-day from Lady Holland. The air of North 
Wiltshire is too keen for Henry. It is difficult to suit him with a 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 389 

climate. We have, to be sure, very little variety of that article in 
England to choose from, and what there is, cannot be called extra 
or superfine ; yet I should not like to be near Marsh at the first 
intimation that Lady Holland is displeased with his climate. But 
pray do not repeat these profane jokes, or I shall see Antonio with 
the bowstring, or John Allen with a few grains of homicide powder 
in a tea-cup. 
The Ministry, I hear, mean to refuse the renewal of the Committee. 

Mr has been at Lord Carlisle's ; I should like very much to 

have seen him. A good deal depends upon what figure a husband 
cuts in a room. Much may be conceded to income and local 
position, but not all. I could have told in a moment whether he 
would, or would not pass, but I did not see him. Lady Georgiana 
was for him, so was Lord Morpeth. I have written you a long 
letter, intending only to write three lines ; but garrulity with tongue 
and pen is my misfortune, and, this evening, yours also. 
Always, my dear Lord, your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



149.] To the Earl Grey. 

Foston, October 29, 181 8. 
My dear Lord, 

You will be so obliging as to write me word when your schemes 
are fixed. My present plan is to be in London for three or four 
months, about the 10th of December. I am truly sorry to receive 
such accounts of Lady Grey. It strikes me that she has a very 
good constitution, and I have no doubt we shall have a very merry 
christening in Portman Square, to which, I strongly suspect, you 
will invite me ; and if Lady Grey (to whom my very kind regards) 
wishes to see a child gracefully held, and to receive proper compli- 
ments upon its beauty, and to witness the consummation of all 
ecclesiastical observances, she will invite me to perform the cere- 
mony. 

Jeffrey, to whom I was going when I left you, is very ill, at 
Glasgow, in the hands of surgeons. 

Douglas I am quite at my ease about ; many thanks for your 
kind anxiety. I have not read the Memoirs you allude to : your 
account of them makes me curious. 

Ever, dear Lord Grey, yours very truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



390 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

150.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, Nov. 23, i$i8. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I entirely agree with you respecting the Americans, and believe 
that I am to the full as much a Philoyankeeist as you are. I doubt 
if there ever was an instance of a new people conducting their 
affairs with so much wisdom, or if ever there was such an extensive 
scene of human happiness and prosperity. However, you could 
not know that such were my opinions ; or if you did, you might 
imagine I should sacrifice them to effect ; and in either case your 
caution was proper, 

I go to London the 1 5th of December, and will send you "America" 
before then. I certainly will make you a visit at Edinburgh ; and 
remain ever, my dear Jeffrey, most sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



1 Si.] To the Earl Grey. 

Foston, Nov. 30, 18 18. 
Dear Lord Grey, 

I will send Lady Grey the news from London when I get there. 
I am sure she is too wise a woman not to be fond of gossiping ; I 
am fond of it, and have some talents for it. 

I recommend you to read Hall, Palmer, Fearon, and Bradling^s 
Travels in America, particularly Fearon; these four books may, 
with ease, be read through between breakfast and dinner. There 
is nothing so curious and interesting as the rapidity with which the 
Americans are spreading themselves over that immense continent. 

It is quite contrary to all probability that America should remain 
in an integral state. They aim at extending from sea to sea, and 
have already made settlements on the Pacific. There can be no com- 
munity of interest between people placed under such very different 
circumstances : the maritime Americans, and those who communi- 
cate with Europe by the Mississippi, are at this moment, as far as 
interest can divide men, two separate people. There does not ap- 
pear to be in America at this moment one man of any considerable 
talents. They are a very sensible people ; and seem to have con- 
ducted their affairs, upon the whole, very well. Birkbeck's second 
book is not so good as his first. He deceives himself, — says he 
wishes to deceive himself, — and is not candid. If a man chooses 
to say, " I will live up to my neck in mud, fight bears, swim rivers, 
and combat backwoodsmen, that I may ultimately gain an independ- 
ence for myself and children," this is plain and intelligible ; but, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 391 

by Birkbeck's account, it is much like settling at Putney or Kew ; 
only the people are more liberal and enlightened. Their economy 
and their cheap government will do some good in this country by 
way of example. Their allowance to Munro is ^5000 per annum ; 
and he rinds his own victuals, fire, and candles ! 

Ever yours, dear Lord Grey, most sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 



152.] To the Countess Grey. 

January 12, 1819. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

Do you know any sensible, agreeable person of the name of Allen, 
a bachelor and a layman ? There is likely to be a vacancy soon in 
Dulwich College, and no such person as I have described can be 
found. 

I have no shyness with strangers, and care not where and with 
whom I dine. To-day I dined with Sir Henry Torrens, the Duke 
of York's secretary, and found him a very gentleman-like, civilised 
man, with what would pass in the army for a good understanding. 
I was very well pleased with all I saw, for he has six elegant, pretty 
children, and a very comfortable villa at Fulham ; his rooms were 
well lighted, warmed in the most agreeable, luxurious manner with 
Russian stoves, and his dinner excellent. Everything was perfectly 
comfortable. What is the use of fish or venison, when the back- 
bone is six degrees below the freezing-point ? Of all miserable 
habitations, an English house, either in very hot or very cold weather, 
is the worst. 

My little boy, whom you were so good as to inquire about, is 
quite well, and returned to Westminster. He has fought two or 
three battles successfully, and is at the head of his class. 

I hope Lord Grey liked Burdett's letter to Cobbett. It is excel- 
lent, and will do that consummate villain some mischief; he is still 
a good deal read. 

I passed four hours yesterday with my children in the British 
Museum ; it is now put on the best possible footing, and exhibited 
courteously and publicly to all. The visitors when I was there 
were principally maid-servants. Fifty thousand people saw it last 
year. My kindest regards, if you please, to my young friends, and 
to the excellent Lord of Howick. 

Ever, my dear Lady Grey, yours most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 

I am going to Bath next week, to see my father, aged eighty. 



392 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

153.] To the Countess Grey. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Macdonald spoke extremely well, and to the entire satisfaction 
of all his friends. Sir Robert Wilson was a complete failure : he 
could lead an army in or out of a defile, but cannot speak. Mr 

L , the jocular Yorkshire member, is supposed to be the most 

consummately impudent man that ever passed the H umber. Waith- 
man, the linendraper, spoke very well, and with great propriety ; he 
has been an improved man ever since Lord Grey gave him such a 
beating. Mr Ellis, son of Lord Mendip, appears upon the London 
arena ; — politics unknown ; a very gentleman-like, sensible young 
man, but, I fear, a Tory. 

I met Lady C L last night, the first time I have seen 

her since the book : a very cold manner on my part. Four sides of 
paper the next morning from her, and a plain and vigorous chas 
tisement from me ; but not uncivil. I am a great man for mercy ; 
and I told her, if she would conduct herself with prudence and 
common sense, her conduct would in time be forgotten. 

We had a large party at the Berrys' last night ; very agreeable, 
and everybody there. 

Antonio is married to one of the under cook-maids, which makes 
the French cook very angry, as an interference with his department 
and perquisites. They report that Pidcock of the Exeter Change, is 
to take Antonio. 

Tierney (not, as you know, inclined to be sanguine) is in very 
good spirits, and expects great divisions. 

Tell my Lord, if he wants to read a good savoury ecclesiastical 
pamphlet, to read Jonas Dennis's " Concio Cleri," a book of about 
one hundred and fifty page's ; he is the first parson who has caught 
scent of the Roman Catholic Bill, passed at the end of the last 
Parliament ; and no she-bear robbed of her whelps can be more 
furious. 

A new actor has appeared, a Mr Farren, an Irishman ; very much 
admired. I have not heard him, for I never go to plays, and should 
not care (except for the amusement of others) if there was no theatre 
in the whole world ; it is an art intended only for amusement, and 
it never amuses me. We are very gay here, and S— takes it 
kindly and is not afraid. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 393 

154.] To the Countess Grey. 

Holland House. No date. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

I write from Holland House, where all are very well, except 
Charles, who is returned with a fit of the jaundice ; but it is not of 
any consequence. I scarcely ever saw a more pleasing, engaging, 
natural young man. 

I am truly glad to hear you are in good spirits. I believe, when 
any serious good quality or wise exertion is required of you, you 
will rummage about, and come out with it at last. 

We had a large party at dinner here yesterday : — Dr Wollaston, 
the great philosopher, who did not say one word ; William Lamb ; 
Sir Henry Bunbury ; Palmella, the Portuguese Ambassador ; Lord 
Aberdeen ; the Exquisite ; Sir William Grant, a rake and dis- 
orderly man of the town, recently Master of the Rolls ; Whishaw, 
a man of fashion ; Frere ; Hallam, of the " Middle Ages ; * and 
myself. In spite of such heterogeneous materials, we had a plea- 
sant party. Mary is becoming very handsome. 

Sir Henry Halford told me that the Queen's property was esti- 
mated at ;£ 150,000, including jewels of every description. The 
^28,000 of jewels she received from the King at her marriage, she 
has given back to him. 

It is reported that the Chancellor wishes to retire, if a successor 
could be found to exclude Leach, whom he hates. The seals are 
said to have been offered to, and refused by, Sir William Grant ; 

and the Irish Chancellor is talked of. Lord is suspected to 

have written some verses himself. He went out a calculator, and 
is returned a child of Nature, and probably a lyric bard. 

God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! 

S. S. 



155.] To the Countess Grey. 

20 SavilleRow, Feb. 5, i8ic> 
Dear Lady Grey, 

Tierney made a very good speech, very well calculated to get 
votes. Frankland Lewis did very well. Mr Maberley introduced 
some very striking arguments, but got wrong toward the end. 
This is the Augustan age of aldermen. Alderman Heygate has far 
exceeded Waithman, who spoke very well. 

Nothing will, I believe, be said, by way of eulogium, upon 
Romilly and Elliott ; a foolish, parading practice, veiy properly put 
an end to. 



394 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

When you come to town again, pray see the new Custom-House. 
The attractive objects in it are the long room, one of the finest I 
ever saw in my life ; and the fagade, towards the river. I have 
also seen, this day, the Mint, which I think would please you. 
Lord Grey's Miss O'Neil is accused of ranting. 

Antonio at last, ran away and offered himself to Lady C 

L . She has taken two days to consider of it. 

Lord Grey will like that article in the Edinburgh Review upon 
" Universal Suffrage :" it is by Sir James Mackintosh. There is a 
pamphlet on Bullion, by Mr Copplestone, of Oxford, much read ; 
but bullion, I think, is not a favourite dish at Howick. 

Sydney Smith. 



156.] To the Earl Grey. 

Saville Row, Feb. 19, 18 19 
My dear Lord Grey, 

I am heartily glad that it has all ended so well, and that Lady 
Grey's misery and your anxiety are at an end; and I do assure you, 
it has diffused a universal joy among your friends here. Pray say 
everything that is kind from me to Lady Grey. 

I was on the hustings the greater part of the morning yesterday, 
with the Miss Berrys and Lady Charlotte Lindsay. Hobhouse has 
some talent for addressing the mob. They would not hear Lamb 
nor Hunt. Lamb's election is considered as safe. 

Lauderdale is better to-day. I cannot make out what the attack 
has been, but I suspect, to speak the plain truth, apoplectic. His 
memory was almost entirely gone from about one o'clock to six ; 
in the course of the evening he completely recovered it, and is now 
getting rapidly well. In future he must be more idle, and think less 
of bullion and the country ; with these precautions, he has a good 
many years before him. 

It is generally thought that Government would have been beaten 
last night, if letters had been sent on the side of Opposition, as they 
were on the other side. 

You must read Cobbett's Grammar ; it is said to be exceedingly 
good. I went yesterday to see the Penitentiary : it is a very great 
national work, and well worth your seeing ; and tell Lady Grey, 
when she comes to town, to walk on that very fine terrace between 
Vauxhall and Westminster Bridge. It is one of the finest things 
about London. 

I agree with you in all you say about the democrats ; they are as 
much to be kept at bay with the left hand, as the Tories are with 
the right. Ever yours, very sincerely, dear Lord Grey, 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 395 

157.] To the Countess Grey. 

1819. 

Dear Lady Grey, 

It is now generally thought that the Chancellor will stay in. The 
Chancellor of Ireland would not take the office if offered to him. 
If Lord Eldon does give up, Baron Richards is thought to be his 
most probable successor. 

When Lord Erskine was ill at Oatlands,* Mr Dawson dressed 
himself up as the new Lady Erskine, and sent up word that she 
wished to see the Duchess. Lord Lauderdale, who was with her, 
came out to prevent the intrusion of the new peeress ; who kicked, 
screamed, and scratched, and vowed she would come in. At last, 
Lauderdale took her up in his arms, and was going to carry her 
down-stairs ; but Lord Alvanley pretending to assist Lauderdale, 
opened the door. Lady Erskine extricated herself from the Scotch 
Hercules, and, with torn veil and dishevelled hair, flung herself at 
the Duchess's feet ! Lauderdale stamped about like one mad, 
expecting every moment the Duchess would go into hysterics. The 
scene was put an end to by a universal roar of laughter from every- 
body in the room ; and the astonished Lauderdale beheld the 
peeress kicking off her petticoats, and collapsing into a well-known 
dandy ! In the meanwhile, poor Lord Erskine lies miserably ill ; 
and if he does not die from the illness, will probably die from the 
effects of it. 

The Hollands have read Rogers's poem, and like it. The verses 
on Paestum are said to be beautiful. The whole poem is not more 
than eight hundred lines. Luttrell approves : I have not see it yet. 

I went yesterday to see the national monuments in St Paul's, and 
never beheld such a disgusting heap of trash. It is a disgrace to 
a country to encourage such artists. Samuel Johnson's monument, 
by old Bacon, is an exception. I have seen to-day, at the Prince's 
Riding-House, the casts from the Florence Gallery, of Niobe and 
her Children, arranged by Cockerell's son upon a new theory* 
They give me very great pleasure ; pray see them when you come 
to town. Afterwards I went over Carlton House, with Nash, the 
architect. The suite of golden rooms, 450 feet in length, is extremely 
magnificent ; still, not good enough for a palace. 

Brougham, I think, does not look well. He has been too busily 
engaged. If he would stint himself to doing twice as much as two 
of the most active men in London, it would do very well. 

We talked at Holland House to-night of good reading, and it was 
voted that Charles Earl Grey was one of the best readers in England. 

* The Duke of York's house, near Walton. 



396 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. . 

Lord Holland proposed the motion, and I seconded it. But it is 
one o'clock in the morning, and I must go to bed. 
Ever, dear Lady Grey, yours very affectionately and sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 



158.] To the Countess Grey. 

1 8 19. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

Opposition seems to get stronger and stronger every day. The 
most sanguine think the Ministry will be beaten ; the least so, that 
Vansittart and the Doctor will be thrown overboard. 

I have read Rogers ; there are some very good descriptions, — the 
Mother and Child, Mr Fox at St Ann's Hill, and several more. 
The beginning of the verses on Psestum are very good too. I am 
going to dine with the Miss Berrys to-day, where I am in high 
favour, and am reckoned a wit. 

Very bad accounts of Lord Erskine, — very ill and languid from 
the attack, though out of danger. 

I am glad to hear from Sir Charles Monck that rents begin to 
be paid again in Northumberland ; I thought the practice had been 
lost altogether. 

Sydney Smith. 



159.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, April 2, 18 19. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

In talking of subjects, why should I not take up that of Tithes ? 
It is untouched in our Review, and of general English interest. 
My doctrines upon it are, that they should be commuted for corn 
payments ; but I will undertake to make a good article upon it and 
a liberal one. 

It pleases me sometimes to think of the very great number of 
important subjects which have been discussed in so enlightened a 
manner in the Edinburgh Review. It is a sort of magazine of 
liberal sentiments, which I hope will be read by the rising genera- 
tion, and infuse into them a proper contempt for their parents' 
stupid and unphilosophical prejudices. 

We have all been making a long stay in London, and succeeded 
very well there. 

You see this spirited House of Commons knows how to demean 
itself when any solid act of baseness, such as the ten thousand 
pounds to the Duke of York, is in agitation. Scarlett has made a 
very great character as a speaker. Mackintosh made a prodigious 



LETTERS OF THE REV, S YDNEY SMITH. 397 

speech on the reform of the criminal law. I wish you would come 
into Parliament and outdo them both, as I verily believe you 
would. God bless you, dear Jeffrey ! 

Sydney Smith. 



160.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, May 17, 18 19. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I wrote to you some time since, proposing for myself an article 
upon Tithes, to which you immediately consented. I learn from 
Brougham (through Allen however) that he had, above a twelve- 
month since, with your consent, engaged this subject. Is this so ? 
If it is, would it not be better to keep some memorandum of these 
sort of engagements ? — (excuse the impertinence of the suggestion.) 
If it is not so, I will proceed. In the meantime, I will proceed 
upon an article of Mr Dennis and the Church, and I have finished 
a short article of Heude's " Travels across the Desert from Bagdad 
to Constantinople." I shall proceed with such sort of books till 
some interesting subject occurs to me of greater importance. 1 
have already your consent to Mr Dennis. 

Poor Seymour ! * Every year thins the ranks of our old friends. 
Those who remain must take closer order. 

I have read no article but Ross, which I like, and Laney, which 
I do not dislike, though I think it might have been more enter- 
taining. 

What a singular Parliament this is ! It all proceeds from paying 
when they are not frightened. The severe scrutiny into evaded 
taxes has thickened the ranks of Opposition. 

I long to see you, but locomotion becomes every year more 
difficult, because I get poorer and poorer as my family grows up. 
God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



161.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Saville Row, June, 18 19. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
This number of the Review is much liked, in spite of the non- 
sense I have contributed: particularly, I think, Mackintosh's paper 
on Universal Suffrage. 

The Opposition expect to muster strong. Tierney, who is always 
the reverse of sanguine, talks of one hundred and eighty or two 
hundred. 

* Lord Webb Seymour, brother to the Duke of Somerset. 



393 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Rogers's poem is just out. The Hollands speak very highly of 
it. Crabbe is coming out with a poem of twelve thousand lines, for 
which, and the copy of his other works, Murray is to give him three 
thousand pounds ; a sum which Crabbe has heard mentioned 
before, but of which he can form no very accurate numerical 
notion. All sums beyond a hundred pounds must be to him mere 
indistinct vision — clouds and darkness. 

Lord Byron's satires, brought over by Lord Lauderdale, are sent 
back for mitigation down to the standard law level. Murray is 
afraid of his ears. Lord John Russell is coming out with the 
Memoirs of Lord Russell, and Miss Berry with those of Lady 
Russell. 

Ever, my dear friend, yours most truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



162.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Foston, July 7, 1 819. 
Dear Allen, 

I have never a cold in winter, by any accident or any careless- 
ness ; in summer, no attention can preserve me from them ; and 
they come upon me with a violence which is extremely distressing : 
no determination to the lungs, no cough, merely catarrh, but catarrh 
which prevents me from hearing, seeing, smelling, or speaking for 
weeks together, indeed all the summer ; and this has been the case 
for many years. Can you do me any good ? 

Can you give me any subject, or tell me any book, for the 
Review ? I have sent a long article upon Botany Bay. 

Pray tell me how Lord Holland is, and how my brother is. My 
eldest son, Douglas (whom you may remember at Holland House), 
has succeeded in the trial at Westminster, and Hall * has promised 
to remember him in the election to Christchurch. This is very 
well if he does not succeed in the attempt to go to the West Indies, 
— a much more certain road to independence than any he is likely 
to get into in this country ; but Baring, in the immensity of his 
transactions, is hardly likely to keep in mind anything so unim- 
portant. 

What are your plans for the summer ? 

I have read Galiani's letters, but they are so utterly insignificant, 
that there is nothing more to be said of them than that they are 
not worth speaking about. I scarcely ever read a more insignifi- 
cant collection of letters. He wrote a little tract in the beginning 
of life about the importation of corn ; and the recollection of that 

* Dean of Christchurch, Oxford. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 399 

is the subject of the letters, for twenty years, to Madame D'lipinay; 
or, if there is any variation, of his trumpery commissions to the 
good-natured woman. 

" Lettres a l'auteur d'un ouvrage ayant pour titre, Superstitions 
et Prestiges des Philosophes du 18 siecle, dans lequel on examine 
plusieurs opinions qui mettent obstacle a l'entier 6tablissement de 
la Religion en France ; par M. Delcuse, 8vo." Do you know 
anything of this book ?— and of " Campagne de l'Armee Francaise 
en Portugal, 1810-11 ; avec un precis de celles qui l'ont prece'de ; 
par un Officier supdrieur employe" dans l'e'tat-major de cette 
amide n ? 

Yours, my dear Allen, very truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



163.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, July 30, 1819. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I hear you are going to Brougham's. I should like most 
exceedingly to meet you there, but it is hardly possible. Poor 
Playfair ! 

You have never told me how your little girl is. 
What do you think -will become of all these political agitations ? 
I am strongly inclined to think, whether now or twenty years hence, 
that Parliament nmst be reformed. The case that the people have 
is too strong to be resisted ; an answer may be made to it, which 
will satisfy enlightened people perhaps, but none that the mass 
will be satisfied with. I am doubtful whether it is not your 
duty and my duty to become moderate Reformers, to keep off 
worse. 

We are upon the eve here of a good harvest, and I have just 
finished twenty acres of hay. I am far gone in agriculture. God 
bless you, my dear friend ! 

Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



164.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston , August 7, 18 19. 

My dear Jeffrey, 

You must consider that Edinburgh is a very grave place, and 

that you live with philosophers who are very intolerant of nonsense. 

I write for the London, not for the Scotch market, and perhaps more 

people read my nonsense than your sense. The complaint was 



400 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

loud and universal of the extreme dulness and lengthiness of the 
Edinburgh Review. Too much, I admit, would not do of my 
style ; but the proportion in which it exists enlivens the Review, if 
you appeal to the whole public, and not to the eight or ten grave 
Scotchmen with whom you live. I am a very ignorant, frivolous, 
half-inch person ; but, such as I am, I am sure I have done your 
Review good, and contributed to bring it into notice. Such as I 
am, I shall be, and cannot promise to alter. Such is my opinion 
of the effect of my articles. I differ with you entirely about Lieu- 
tenant Heude. To do such things very often would be absurd ; to 
punish a man every now and then for writing a frivolous book is 
wise and proper ; and you would find, if you lived in England, that 
the review of Lieutenant Heude is talked of and quoted for its fun 
and impertinence, when graver and abler articles are thumbed over 
and passed by. Almost any one of the sensible men who write for 
the Review would have written a much wiser and more profound 
article than I have done upon the Game Laws. I am quite certain 
nobody would obtain more readers for his essay upon such a sub- 
ject ; and I am equally certain that the principles are right, and 
that there is no lack of sense in it. 

So I judge myself ; but, after all, the practical appeal is to you. 
If you think my assistance of no value, I am too just a man to be 
angry with you upon that account ; but while I write, I must write 
in my own way, All that I meant to do with Lord Selkirk's case 
was to state it. 

I am extremely sorry for Moore's misfortune, but only know 
generally that he has met with misfortune. God bless you ! 

Your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



165.] To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, August, 1819. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I was just going to write to you or Lord Grey, to make inquiries 
about you ; — first, because I had not heard of you for a long time ; 
next, because somebody told me you were at Malvern, and I wanted 
an explanation of the proceeding. I am very sorry to find it ex- 
plained as you have explained it. God send your object may be 
answered in going there ! 

I am very fond of Malvern ; the double view from the top of the 
hill is one of the finest things I know. My father some years had 
a house some four miles from Malvern, — Broomsbery, Mr Yates's ; 
so I know all the country perfectly well. 

I was extremely sorry to miss you and Lord Grey in London, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 401 

but you rose above the horizon just as I sank. You are both wis,?, 
prudent, and good, so I suppose you have done right in giving up 
your house ; but I sincerely regret any change that lessens my 
chance of seeing you. I smiled when I came to that part of your 
letter where you state that Charles Earl Grey is thoroughly 
ennuyed with Malvern. I can thoroughly understand the effect 
which such a place would have upon him ; I am sorry I am not 
near, to quiz and attack him. 

I wish you and Lord Grey would pay us a visit, and see how 
happy people can be in a small, snug parsonage. I am a great 
farmer ; — am improving, and losing less money than formerly. 
The crops are abundant everywhere, and, as we are free from 
manufactures, there are no complaints. The state of the clothing 
counties of the North (unless the cessation of the demand be tem- 
porary) will become truly alarming. 

Sydney Smith 



166.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, August 16, 18x9. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

Many thanks for your wise and gentlemanlike letter. Perhaps 
I was a little perverse. I will promise to rebel no more, but attend 
to your fatherly admonition, taking it as a proof that you confide in 
the sincere friendship and affection I bear towards you ; and I am 
sure you have no friend in the world who loves you better than I 
do. 

You do me honour when you say the subjects I undertake 
should be important ; but, to omit any other difficulty, there is a 
difficulty in finding such subjects. If you can suggest any to me, 
I shall be obliged. I mention more books than I shall review, 
because many on inspection prove unworthy. I should like to 
write a short article on the Poor Laws. If trade'does not increase, 
there will be a war of the rich against the poor. In that case, you 
and I I am afraid, shall be of different sides. 

Sydney Smith. 

I hope the Manchester riots will appear next number ; I am 
ready for them, if nobody else is. 



1O7.] To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, Nov. 3, iEf§. 
I am truly concerned, my dear Lady Grey, to hear Lord Grey 



402 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

has been so ill ; and I thank you sincerely for the confidence you 
show in my attachment to him, by informing me of it. For 
himself, it would be far better if he could remain quietly in the 
country, but the times will not admit of it ; so do you inculcate 
prudence in what concerns the body, and he will go with the good 
wishes of all honest men. 

I think if I were to talk over the matter with Lord Grey, I should 
hardly differ with him upon any one point ; certainly not upon the 
enormity of the outrage at Manchester, upon the necessity of 
county meetings, upon the reprehensible conduct of Ministers in 
approving of the proceedings of the magistrates, and upon the 
folly and iniquity of dismissing Lord Fitzwilliam. 

I cannot measure the danger ; I guess there is no more danger 
at present than what vigilance and activity, without any new and 
extraordinary coercion, may guard against. With a failing 
revenue, depressed commerce, manufactures, and industry, and with 
an Administration determined to concede nothing, there may be 
hereafter a struggle. If there be, it will not end in democracy, but 
in despotism. In which of these two evils it terminates, is of no 
more consequence than from which tube of a double-barrelled 
pistol I meet my destruction. 

Yours, dear Lady Grey, with affection and respect, 

Sydney Smith. 



168.] To Douglas Smith, Esq., 

Kings Scholar at Westminster College. 

Eos ton Rectory, 1819. 
My dear Douglas, 

Concerning this Mr -, I would not have you put any trust in 

him, for he is not trustworthy ; but so live with him as if one day 
or other he were to be your enemy. With such a character as his, 
this is a necessary precaution. 

In the time you can give to English reading you should consider 
what it is most needful to have, what it is most shameful to want, — 
shirts and stockings before frills and collars. Such is the history 
of your own country, to be studied in Hume, then in Rapin's 
History of England, with Tindal's Continuation. Hume takes you 
to the end of James the Second, Rapin and Tindal will carry you 
to the end of Anne. Then, Coxe's " Life of Sir Robert Walpole," 
and the " Duke of Marlborough ;" and these read with attention to 
dates and geography. Then, the history of the other three or four 
enlightened nations in Europe. For the English poets, I will let 
you off at present with Milton, Dryden, Pope, and Shakspeare ; 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 403 

and remember, always in books keep the best company. Don't 
read a line of Ovid, till you have mastered Virgil ; nor a line of 
Thomson, till you have exhausted Pope ; nor of Massinger, till you 
are familiar with Shakspeare. 

I am glad you liked your box and its contents. Think of us as 
we think of you ; and send us the most acceptable of all presents, — 
the information that you are improving in all particulars. 

The greatest of all human mysteries are the Westminster holi- 
days. If you can get a peep behind the curtain, pray let us know 
immediately the day of your coming home. 

We have had about three or four ounces of rain here, that is all. 
I heard of your being wet through in London, and envied you 
very much. The whole of this parish is pulverised from long and 
excessive drought. Our whole property depends upon the tran- 
quillity of the winds : if it blow before it rains, we shall all be up 
in the air in the shape of dust, and shall be tra?isparished we know 
not where. God bless you, my dear boy ! I hope we shall soon 
meet at Lydiard. 

Your affectionate father, 

Sydney Smith. 



169.] To the Earl Grey. 

Eos ton, York, Dec. 3, 18 19. 
My dear Lord Grey, 

I am truly concerned to see you (in the papers) talking of your 
health, as you are reported to have done. God grant you may be 
more deceived in that, than you are in the state of the country ! 
Pray tell me how you are, when you can find leisure to do so. 

I entirely agree with you that force alone, without some attempts 
at conciliation, will not do. Readers are fourfold in number, 
compared with what they were before the beginning of the French 
war ; and demagogues will, of course, address to them every species 
of disaffection. As the violence of restraint increases, there will be 
private presses, as there are private stills. Juries will acquit, being 
themselves Jacobins. It is possible for able men to do a great deal 
of mischief in libels, which it is extremely difficult to punish as 
libels ; and the worst of it all is, that a considerable portion of what 
these rascals say, is so very true. Their remedies are worse than the 
evils ; but when they state to the people how they are bought and 
sold, and the abuses entailed upon the country by so corrupted a 
Parliament, it is not easy to answer them, or to hang them. 

What I want to see the State do, is to listen in these sad times 
to some of its numerous enemies. Why not do something for the 
Catholics, and scratch them off the list ? Then come the Protestant 



404 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Dissenters. Then, of measures, — a mitigation of the game-laws — 
commutation of tithes — granting to such towns as Birmingham and 
Manchester the seats in Parliament taken from the rottenness of 
Cornwall — revision of the Penal Code — sale of the Crown lands — 
sacrifice of the Droits of Admiralty against a new war ; anything 
that would show the Government to the people in some other 
attitude than that of taxing, punishing, and restraining. I believe 
what Tierney said to be strictly true, that the House of Commons 
is falling into contempt with the people. Democracy has many 
more friends among tradesmen and persons of that class of life 
than is known or supposed commonly. I believe the feeling is 
most rapidly increasing ; and that Parliament, in two or three 
years' time, will meet under much greater circumstances of terror 
than those under which it is at present assembled. 

From these speculations I slide, by a gentle transition, to Lady 
Grey : how is she ? how is Lord Howick ? Are you at your ease 
about the young man ? If ever you will send him, or any of your 
sons, upon a visit to me, it will give me great pleasure to see them. 
They shall hear no Tory sentiments, and Howick will appear to be 
the centre of gaiety and animation compared to Foston. I am 
delighted with the part Lord Lansdowne has taken : he seems to 
have made a most admirable speech ; but, after all, I believe we 
shall go ad veteris Nicolai tristia regna, Pitt ubi combustum Dun- 
dasque videbimus omnes. Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



170.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Saville Row, December, {supposed to be) 18 19, 

My dear Lady Mary, 

I was much amused with your thinking that you had discovered 
me in the Edinburgh Review ; if you look at it again, you will find 
reason to alter your opinion. 

I have brought all my children up to town ; and they are, as you 
may suppose, not a little entertained and delighted. It is the first 
time they have ever seen four people together, except on remark- 
ably fine days at the parish church. There seems to be nobody in 
town, nor will there be, I presume, before the meeting of Parlia- 
ment. 

I am writing to you at two o'clock in the morning, having heard 
of a clergyman who brought himself down from twenty-six to six- 
teen stone in six months, by lessening his sleep. When he began, 
he was so fat that he could not walk, and now he walks every day 
up one of the highest hills in the country, and remains in perfect 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 405 

health. I shall be so thin when you see me, that you may trundle 
me about like a mop. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



171.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

Foston, York, Jan. 3, 1820. 
My dear Davenport, 

I sincerely hope your clerical friend will publish his statement ; 
at the same time, it must not be dissembled that a true and candid 
narrative of what he saw, would for ever put an end to his chance 
of preferment. My opinion is the same as yours upon the Peterloo 
business. I have no doubt everything would have ended at Man- 
chester as it did at Leeds, had there been the same forbearance on 
the part of the magistrates. Either they lost (no great loss) their 
heads, or the devils of local spite and malice had entered into 
them, or the nostrils of the clerical magistrates smelt preferment 
and Court favour ; but let it have been what it will, the effects 
have been most deplorable. 

I do not know who Morier is, unless he writes about Persia ; 
my acquaintance is principally confined to sheep and oxen. 

Have you read " Ivanhoe"? It is the least dull, and the most 
easily read through, of all Scott's novels ; but there are many more 
powerful. The subject, in novels, poems, and pictures, is half the 
battle. The representation of our ancient manners is a fortunate 
one, and ample enough for three or four more novels. 

There are four or five hundred thousand readers more than there 
were thirty years ago, among the lower orders. A market is open 
to the democrat writers, by which they gain money and distinction. 
Government cannot prevent the commerce. A man, if he know 
his business as a libeller, can write enough for mischief, without 
writing enough for the Attorney-General. The attack upon the 
present order of things will go on ; and, unfortunately, the gentle- 
men of the people have a strong case against the House of Com« 
mons and the boroughmongers, as they call them. I think all wise 
men should begin to turn their faces reform-wards. We shall do it 
better than Mr Hunt or Mr Cobbett. Done it must and will be. 

Mrs Sydney sends her kind regards ; in revenge, I beg to be 
remembered to your family, and remain, dear Davenport, very truly 
yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



406 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

1 72.] To th e Earl Grey. 

Foston, Jan. 24, 1820. 
Dear Lord Grey, 

If you want to read an agreeable book, read Golownin's narrative 
of his confinement in, and escape from, Japan ; and I think it may 
do very well for reading out, which I believe is your practice — a 
practice which I approve rather than follow, and neglect it from 
mere want of virtue. I think also you may read De Foe's " Life of 
Colonel Jack," — entertaining enough when his hero is a scoundrel, 
but waxing dull as it gets moral. I never set you any difficult 
tasks in reading, but am as indulgent to you as I am to myself. 

I saw Mr the other night for the first time. 

I am decidedly of opinion that he is like other people. My 
neighbour, Lord Carlisle, gets younger and younger. I am heartily 
rejoiced at Mrs Wilmot's marriage ; but where will Lord Dacre 
pass his evenings now ? Nothing could be more generous and dis- 
interested on his part than to relinquish so pleasing a society. If 
this is not devotion, what is ? 

There are no appearances here of reviving trade ; though many 
of declining agriculture. If the manufacturing misery continues, 
there will be a reaction of the Radicals. Assassinations and secret 
swearings a V Irla,7idaise, or something as bad, — marking an angry 
and suffering people struggling against restrictions. My curiosity 
is very much excited by Lord John's motion. Lord Castlereagh's 
assent to it must have surprised you, for I think his assent includes 
everything that is important ; that a disfranchised borough may be 
taken out of the surrounding Hundred, and conferred elsewhere ; 
or rather, that it need not necessarily be thrown into the surround- 
ing Hundred. 

I hope Lady Grey and all your children are well, and that you 
are improved in health, so as to have passed your Christmas 
merrily in the midst of your family. You have naturally a genius 
for good eating and drinking, — as I have often witnessed, and 
mean to witness again. 

We have all been ill ; I attended two of my children through a 
good stout fever of the typhus kind without ever calling in an 
apothecary but for one day. I depended upon blessed antimony, 
and watched anxiously for the time of giving bark. They are 
both now perfectly well. Pray remember me very kindly to dear 
Lady Grey ; and believe me, my dear Lord, with sincere respect 
and attachment, yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 407 

173.] To E. Davenport, Esq. 

January 29, 1820. 
Dear Davenport, 
I think (but that thinking is mere conjecture) that you will be 
time enough for this number if your packet goes off in a fortnight 
after receiving this note ; perhaps in a month, but the sooner the 
better. The publication of the Review is not punctual, but depends 
upon the kindness of Minerva in many parts of the island. 

Nobody of whom I know so little, and to whose accuracy and 
fairness I would rather trust, than to those of Mr Stanley.* Mr 
T I do not know. Could you not procure some facts respect- 
ing the state of the late Incumbent at Rochdale at the Massacre 
of Peterloo ? 

The thing wanted for the lady in question will be the sober, 
domestic virtues of laying eggs and hatching them. The nest will 
be cotton, — and a very pleasant nest it is. I wish you were a York- 
shire squire keeping a large house of call in the pleasantest part of 
the North Riding. 

Ever yours sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 

Best compliments to Miss Davenport, who, if she keep a list of 
her conquests, will be so good as to put me down in the clergy- 
man's leaf. 



174.] To Miss Berry. 

Foston, Feb. 27, 1820. 

I thank you very much for the entertainment I have received 
from your book. I should however have been afraid to marry 
such a woman as Lady Rachel ; it would have been too awful. 
There are pieces of china very fine and beautiful, but never intended 
for daily use. . . . 

I have hardly slept out of Foston since I saw you. God send 
I may be still an animal, and not a vegetable ! but I am a little 
uneasy at this season for sprouting and rural increase, for fear I 
should have undergone the metamorphose so common in country 
livings. I shall go to town about the end of March ; it will be 
completely empty, and the dregs that remain will be entirely occu- 
pied about hustings and returning-officers. 

Commerce and manufactures are still in a frightful state of 
stagnation. 

* Afterwards Bishop of Norwich. 



4o8 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

No foreign barks in British ports arc seen, 
StufEM to the water's edge with velveteen, 
Or bursting with big bales of bombazine ; 
No distant climes demand our corduroy, 
Unmatch'd habiliment for man and boy ; 
No fleets of fustian quit the British shore ; 
The cloth-creating engines cease to roar, : 
Still is that loom which breech'd the world before. 

I am very sorry for the little fat Duke de Berri, but infinitely 
more so for the dismissal of Decazes, — a fatal measure. 

I must not die without seeing Paris. Figure to yourself what a 
horrid death, — to die without seeing Paris ! I think I could make 
something of this in a tragedy, so as to draw tears from Donna 
Agnes and yourself. Where are you going to? When do you 
return ? Why do you go at all ? Is Paris more agreeable than 
London ? 

We have had a little plot here in a hay-loft. God forbid any- 
body should be murdered ! but, if I were to turn assassin, it should 
not be of five or six Ministers, who are placed where they are by 
the folly of the country gentlemen, but of the hundred thousand 
squires, to whose stupidity and folly such an Administration owes 
its existence. 

Ever your friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



175.] To the Earl Grey. 

Saville Row, April 15, 1820. 
Dear Lord Grey, 

People — that is, Whig people — are very much out of humour 
about Lord Morpeth. Lord Morpeth bears it magnanimously ; 
and, I really believe, is glad he has left Parliament, though he does 
not like the mode. Lord Holland is very well ; Lady Holland I 
have not yet seen. I have seen Lady Grey, the General, and Mrs 
Grey. Brougham attends frequently at the Treasury, upon the 
Queen's business. 

The King sits all day long with Lady C , sketching proces- 
sions and looking at jewels : in the meantime, she tells everywhere 
all that he tells to her. It is expected Burdett will have two years, 
for which I am heartily sorry. Hunt, I hope, will have six, if it is 
possible to inflict so many ; not so much for his political crimes, 
but for himself ; he is such a thorough ruffian. But he acquitted 
himself with great ability on his trial. 

A narrative is handed about here, written upon the spot by 
Stanley, a clergyman, brother to Sir John, — a very sensible, reason- 
able man. Read it before your first speech. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 409 

Walter Scott's novel is generally thought to be a failure ; its only 
defenders I have heard of are Lord Grenville and Sir William 
Grant. Furniture Hope has published a novel ; Malthus, a new 
book of Political Economy. I was glad to see the health of Lord 
John so firmly established ; he is improved in every respect. 
People are red-hot again about the Manchester business, but the 
leading topic is Scotch and Yorkshire riots. I am truly sorry you 
do not come up, but I am not quite sure yet that you won't be 
provoked to come. Can I do anything for you in town ? If any 
of the Ladies Grey want anything in the dress line, I will execute 
it better than Lord Lauderdale himself. Ever most sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



176.] To the Earl Grey, 

May 10, 1820. 
My dear Lord Grey, 

I will try to get you a copy of Stanley's Narrative, which is 
printed, not published. I have seen your two daughters at Lady 
Lansdowne's, and at Lady Derby's ; they both look well, and the 
gowns look more like French gowns than other people's gowns do. 

I am quite out of patience with Lady : her fate will be to 

marry on the Bath road or the Norfolk road ; any other such offer 
on the North road can hardly be expected to occur. I think you 
might have talked it over with her, and good-naturedly attacked 
the romantic. The young man was introduced to me, or rather I 
to him, at Lord Jersey's, — a very decent, creditable-looking young 
gentleman, and a good judge of sermons. He paid me many com- 
pliments upon mine, delivered last Sunday, against bad husbands, 
so that it is clear he intended to have made a very good one. 

The B of is turned out to be baited next Friday upon 

the case, which appears to be one of great atrocity and perse- 
cution. It will end with their rejecting his petition, upon the 
principle of his having had his remedy in a court of law, of which 
he has neglected to avail himself; but the real good will be done 
by the publicity. 

The picture of Our Saviour going into Jerusalem, by Haydon, is 
very bad ; the general Exhibition good, as I hear. I have seen 
West's pictures :— Death on the White Horse— Jesus Rejected ; I 
am sorry to say I admire them both. A new poem, by Milman, 
author of " Fazio," called " Jerusalem," or " The Fall of Jerusalem," 
very much admired, as I hear. Dudley Ward a good deal im- 
proved, — I believe, principally by Ellis's imitation of him, of which 
he is aware. The Whig Queen revives slowly; the seditious infant 



4io LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

not yet christened. Lady Jersey as beautiful and as kind and 
agreeable as ever. Long live Queen Sarah ! 

Bayley told Tierney, Hunt would have been acquitted if he had 
called no witnesses. Tierney well, but veiy old, and unfit for any- 
thing but gentle work. I am going to dine with the Granvilles, to 
meet the Hollands. Lady Granville is nervous, on acccount of her 
room being lined with Spitalfields silk, which always makes Lady 
Holland ill ; means to pass it off as foreign and smuggled, but has 
little chance of success. Creevy thinks the session opens in a very 
mealy-mouthed manner. I like your nephew, Whitbread, the mem- 
ber, very much. 

Lady Grey knows my regard and respect, and that I always send 
her such courtesy and kindness as I am capable of, whether I write 
it or not. 

Sydney Smith. 



177.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, York, May 19, 1820. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

You know what London is for anybody; much more what it is 
for me, who am feasted so much above my merits and my powers 
of digestion ; accordingly I have done nothing, which I tell you 
with all penitence. My Irish books, which I took with me to 
London, are coming back by sea ; therefore there is no chance 
of Ireland for this Review. However, I have gained oral informa- 
tion of considerable consequence. I have sent for the French 
Travels in Africa, translated and commented upon by Bowditch ; 
and as soon as it comes, shall proceed upon it. I shall now send 
you a list of what I have offered to do, what you have allowed, 
and shall make you some fresh offers. 

I found in London both my articles very popular, — upon the 
Poor Laws and America. The passage on Taxation had great 
success. 

I hope you keep a list of books granted. Pray do. No news in 
town. Voting on one side, reasoning on the other ! Everything 
like economy rejected with horror. Kindest regards to Murray. 
God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



178.] To Lord Holland. 

Foston, June 11, 182a 
My dear Lord Holland, 
I return you many thanks for your letter, and for the exertion in 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 4.11 

my behalf which you have made, with your accustomed friendship 
and kindness. 

The Chancellor is quite right about political sermons, and in this 
I have erred ; but I have a right to preach on general subjects of 
toleration, and the fault is not mine if the congregation apply my 
doctrine to passing events. But I will preach no more upon politi- 
cal subjects ; I have not done so for many years, from a conviction 
that it was unfair. You gave me great pleasure by what you said 
to the Chancellor of my honesty and independence. I sincerely 
believe I shall deserve the character at your hands as long as I live. 
To say that I am sure I shall deserve it, would be as absurd as if a 
lady were to express an absolute certainty of her future virtue. In 
good qualities that are to continue for so many years, we can only 
hofie for their continuance. 

The incumbent is proceeding by slow degrees to Buxton. I wish 
him so well, that, under other circumstances, I should often write to 
know how he was going on ; at present I must appear unfriendly, 
to avoid appearing hypocritical. I have spent at least ^4000 on 
this place ; for you must remember I had not only a house, but 
farm-buildings, to make ; and there had been no resident clergy- 
man here for a hundred and fifty years. I have also played my 
part in the usual manner, as doctor, justice, pacifier, preacher, 
farmer, neighbour, and diner-out. If I can mend my small 
fortunes, I shall be very glad ; if I cannot, I shall not be very 
sorry. In either case, I shall remain your attached and grateful 
friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

179.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Foston, July, 1820. 
My dear Lady, 

You see revolutions are spreading all over the world — and from 
armies. 

Would Mr be pleased with an improvement of public 

liberty, which originated from the Coldstream Guards ? Seriously 
speaking, these things are catching, and though I want improve- 
ment, I should abhor such improvers ; besides, we shall get old- 
fashioned in all our institutions, and be stimulated, through vanity, 
to changes too rapid and too extensive. 

Lord Liverpool's messenger mistook the way, and instead of 
bringing the mitre to me, took it to my next door neighbour, Dr 
Carey, who very fraudulently accepted it. Lord Liverpool is ex- 
tremely angry, and I am to have the next ! 

Sydney Smith. 



412 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

180.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Foston, York, Sept. 3, 1820. 
My dear Murray, 

Many thanks for your kindness in inquiring about your old 
friends. I am very well, doubling in size every year, and becom- 
ing more and more fit for the butcher. Mrs Sydney is much as 
she was. 

I seldom leave home (except on my annual visit to London), and 
this principally because I cannot afford it. My income remains 
the same, my family increases in expense. My constitutional 
gaiety comes to my aid in all the difficulties of life ; and the re- 
collection that, having embraced the character of an honest man 
and a friend to rational liberty, I have no business to repine at that 
mediocrity of fortune which I knew to be its consequence. 

Mrs is a very amiable young woman, inferior in beauty to 

Lady Charlotte Campbell, and not so remarkable as Madame de 
Stael for the vigour of her understanding. Her husband appears 
to be everything that is amiable and respectable. 

The Queen is contemptible ; she will be found guilty, and sent 
out of the country with a small allowance, and in six months be 
utterly forgotten. So it will, I think, end ; but still I think Lord 
Liverpool very blamable in not having put a complete negative upon 
the whole thing. It would have been better for the country, and 
exposed his party to less risk than they have been already exposed 
to in this business. The Whigs certainly would have refused to 
meddle with the divorce. 

I am sorry to read in your letter such an account of Scotland. 
Do you imagine the disaffection to proceed from anything but 
want of employment? or, at least, that full employment, inter- 
spersed with a little hanging, will not gradually extinguish the bad 
spirit ? 

I have just read " The Abbot ; " it is far above common novels, 
but of very inferior execution to his others, and hardly worth 
reading. He has exhausted the subject of Scotland, and worn 
out the few characters that the early periods of Scotch history 
could supply him with. Meg Merrilies appears afresh in every 
novel. 

I wish you had told me something about yourself. Are you 
well? rich? happy? Do you digest? Have you any thoughts of 
marrying? My whole parish is to be sold for ^50,000 ; pray buy 
it, quit your profession, and turn Yorkshire squire. We should be 
a model for squires and parsons. God bless you ! All the family 
unite in kind regards. Shall we ever see you again ? 

S. S. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 413 

181.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Sedgeley, October ; 1820. 
My dear Lady Mary, 

I cannot shut my eyes, because, if I open them, I shall see what 
is disagreeable to the Court. I have no more doubt of the Queen's 
guilt than I have of your goodness and excellence. But do not, on 
that account, do me the injustice of supposing that I am deficient 
in factious feelings and principles, or that I am stricken by the 
palsy of candour. I sincerely wish the Queen may be acquitted, 
and the Bill and its authors may be thrown out. Whether justice 
be done to the Royal plaintiff is of no consequence : indeed he has 
no right to ask for justice on such points. I must, however, preserve 
my common sense and my factious principles distinct ; and believe 
the Queen to be a very slippery person, at the moment I rejoice at 
the general conviction of her innocence. 

I am, as you see, near Manchester. While here, I shall study the 
field of Peterloo. 

You will be sorry to hear the trade and manufactures of these 
counties are materially mended, and are mending. I would not 
mention this to you, if you were not a good Whig : but I know you 
will not mention it to anybody. The secret, I much fear, will get 
out before the meeting of Parliament. There seems to be a fatality 
which pursues us. When, oh when, shall we be really ruined ? 

Pray send me some treasonable news about the Queen. Will the 
people rise ? Will the greater part of the House of Lords be thrown 
into the Thames ? Will short work be made of the Bishops ? If 
you know, tell me ; and don't leave me in this odious state of in- 
nocence, when you can give me so much guilty information, and 
make me as wickedly instructed as yourself. And if you know that 
the Bishops are to be massacred, write by return of post. 

Do you know how poor is handled in the Quarterly Review ? 

It bears the mark of **** ; I hope it is not his, for the sake of his 
character. Let me be duller than Sternhold and Hopkins, if I am 
to prove my wit at the expense of my friends ! and in print too ! 
God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



182.] To Leonard Horner, Esq. 

Foston, 1820. 
My dear Sir, 
My friend (a potter), to whom we are all so deeply indebted 
every night and morning, wishes to place a son at Edinburgh, and 
I have promised to inquire for him. Pray be so good as to tell me 



414 LMTTMHS OF THE REV. SYDXRY SMITH. 

the terms of Pillans, and also mention some good Presbyterian body 
who takes pupils at no great salary. Never mind whether Whig 
or Tory, philosopher or no philosopher ; a potter has nothing to 
do with such matters ; all I require is that he should be steady and 
respectable, and that the young fashioner of vases and basins should 
have an apartment to himself, in which he may meditate intensely 
on clay. Do me the favour to mention terms. 

Why don't you and Mrs Horner come and see us, and hear me 
upon the subject of turnips ? The corn is half destroyed. There 
is no end to the luck of this Administration ; they were beginning 
to be unpopular with the country gentlemen, but now prices will 
get up. 

I am just returned from a long journey into Somersetshire. 
Kind regards to your family, and name your time for coming here. 

Ever most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



183.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, October, 1820. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I shall be much obliged to you to print my two articles in the 
next Review, and to inform me of your intention on that point, 
under cover to G. Philips, Esq., M.P., Sedgeley, Manchester. 

My Ireland I have taken some pains with. The history of the 
termination of the rivers of Botany Bay is curious, the article short, 
and undertaken at your special request that I should write another 
article. 

Is Southey's " Life of Wesley " appropriated ? Is Lord John 
Russell's book, called u Essays and Sketches of Life and Character, 
by a Gentleman who has left his Lodgings" ? 

It is impossible but that the Queen will defeat the King, and 
throw out the Administration. The majority of Bishops, with the 
Archbishop of York at their head, are against the divorce ; the 
Archbishop of Canterbury is for it. 

We have had a good harvest, but there is no market for any- 
thing. 

I am sorry to see the appointment of Wilson. If Walter Scott 
can succeed in nominating a successor to Reid and Stewart, there 
is an end of the University of Edinburgh : your Professors then 
become competitors in the universal race of baseness and obsequi- 
ousness to power. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 415 

184.] To Edward Davi nport, Esq. 

Fos/ou, Nov. 19, 1820. 
Dear Davenport, 

The City of York have met and passed resolutions to address 
for a change of Ministers. I have not heard of any proposal for a 
county meeting, nor can I think that anything has yet been done 
which will turn Ministers out of office ; almost all who supported 
them before will continue to support them ; the greater part of 
their friends who voted against them thought the Queen guilty, 
and almost all justified Ministers in beginning the process. The 
case may be different if they make it a point of honour to withhold 
her just rights from the Queen, or to prevent you or me from pray- 
ing for her in public. Upon these points I have no doubt they will 
be defeated ; but if they have the good sense to see that they are 
beaten, and not to make a stand for the baggage-waggons when 
they have lost the field, they may remain Ministers as long as 
Cheshire makes cheeses. I need not say to you that I am heartily- 
glad the Queen is acquitted. 

As for the virtue of the lady, you laymen must decide upon it. 
The style of manners she has adopted does not exactly tally with 
that of holy women in the days that are gone; but let us be 
charitable, and hope for the best. 

The business of the Ministry is surely to prorogue Parliament 
for as long a time as possible. Some new whale may be in sight 
by that time. 

Ever yours, dear Davenport, 

Sydney Smith. 

Read, if you have not read, all Horace Walpole's letters, wherever 
you can find them ; — the best wit ever published in the shape of 
letters. Marvel with me at the fine and spirited things in " Anas- 
tasius ; " they are, it is true, cemented together by a great deal of 
dull matter. 



185.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

Lambton Hall, Dec. 15, 1820. 
Dear Davenport, 
I am just come from Edinburgh, and was staying with Jeffrey 
when your letter arrived. He does not like his editorial functions 
interfered with, and I do not like to interfere with them ; so I 
must leave you and him to settle as to the article itself. If you 
write it, and send it to me, I will play the part of Aristarchus to 



416 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

you ; but remember, — do not accept me for an office of that nature, 
if you are afraid of truth and severity ; upon such subjects I will 
flatter nobody ; nor is it, I am sure, in your nature, or in your 
habits, to require any such thing. 

I shall be at Foston on Sunday, and remain there for the rest of 
my life. 

Scotland is becoming Whiggish and Radical. There is a great 
meeting at Durham to-day, in which Lord Grey is to bear a part. 
I have been staying with him. The Alnwick people came over 
with an address, and drank forty-four bottles of sherry, and fifty- 
two of old port, besides ale ! 

This seems a fine place in a very ugly country. The house is 
full of every possible luxury, and lighted with gas. 

Sydney Smith. 



i 86.] To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, Dec. 30, 1820. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

The day I left Lambton was, fortunately for me, a very cold day, 
as the stage-coach was full. We had the captain of a Scotch vessel 
trading to Russia, an Edinburgh lawyer, an apothecary, a London 
horse-dealer, and myself. They were all very civil and good- 
humoured ; the captain a remarkably clever, entertaining man. 
All were for the Queen, except the horse-dealer. 

Lady Georgiana Morpeth called here yesterday, accompanied by 
Agar Ellis, who is on a short visit to Castle Howard. The Mor- 
peths are just returned from the Duke of Devonshire's. Ellice 
thinks the Ministry will not go out, but proceed languidly with 
small majorities ; I think it most probable they will be driven out. 

The appointment of is too ridiculous to be true. If Peel 

refuses, it is, I suppose, because he does not choose to accept a 
place in a carriage just about to be overturned. The good people 
of Edinburgh, putting together my visit to Lord Grey, my ulterior 
progress to Edinburgh, and the political meeting in that town con- 
sequent upon it, have settled that Lord Grey planned the meeting, 
and that I performed the diplomatic part. 

I will fit the Lady Greys up with conversation for the spring, 

and make them the most dashing girls in London. Poor ! if 

in love before, what will he be next spring ? Poor B ! poor 

E ! poor everybody ! The effect will be universal. 

My kindest regards to Lord Grey and your daughters. My 
children are all perfectly well, so is Mrs Sydney j Douglas, my 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 417 

eldest son, has distinguished himself at Westminster, and is, to 
my great delight, become passionately fond of books. 
Always, my dear Lady Grey, your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — Only think of that obstinate Lord Lauderdale publishing 
his speech ! But Lord Lauderdale, with all his good qualities and 
talents, has an appetite for being hooted and pelted, which is ten 
times a more foolish passion than the love of being applauded and 
huzzaed. You and I know a politician who has no passion for one 
thing or the other ; but does his duty, and trusts to chance how it 
is taken. 



187.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, 1820. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

For the number next but one, I have engaged to write an article 
on Ireland, which shall contain all the information I can collect, 
detailed as well as I know how to detail it. 

The Unitarians think the doctrine of the Trinity to be a profan- 
ation of the Scriptures ; you compel them to many in your churches, 
or rather, I should say, we compel them to marry in our churches ; 
and when the male and female Dissenter are kneeling before the 
altar, much is said to them by the priest, of this, to them, abhorred 
doctrine. They are about to petition Parliament that their mar- 
riages may be put upon the same footing as those of Catholics and 
Quakers. The principles of religious liberty which I have learnt 
(perhaps under you) make me their friend in the question ; and if 
you approve, I will write an article upon it. Upon the receipt of 
your letter in the affirmative, I will write to the dissenting king, 
William Smith, for information. Pray have the goodness to 
answer by return of post, or as soon after as you can, if it is but 
a word ; as despatch in these matters, and in my inacccessible 
situation, is important. 

Sydney Smith. 

188.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

Bath : no date. 
Dear Davenport, 
I think Jeffrey too timid, but he says that the Edinburgh Review 
is watched, and that there is a great disposition to attack it either 
in Scotland or London ; and you must allow that Jeffrey or 

2 D 



4 i 8 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Brougham in the pillory would be a delicious occurrence for the 
Tories : I think John Williams would come and pelt. 

Great light will be thrown upon the circumstances of the mas- 
sacre by Hunt's trial, which of course will be circulated widely 
through the country, and will furnish you with a good plea for 
the introduction of the subject. I heard Hunt at York, and was 
much struck with his boldness, dexterity, and shrewdness. With- 
out any education at all, he is the most powerful barrister this day 
on the Northern Circuit : of course, I do not mean the best in- 
structed, but the man best calculated by nature for that sort of 
intellectual exertion. 

You see by my letter I am in Bath, — to me, one of the most 
disagreeable places in the world ; but I am on a visit to my father, 
eighty-two years of age, in full possession, not only of his senses, 
but of a very vigorous and superior understanding. 

I have written two articles in this Edinburgh Review, — Poor 
Laws and Seybert's America, — but they are both of a dry and 
discouraging nature. 

Adieu ! I hope to see you soon. Ever truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

189.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Foston, 1820. 
Dear Mrs Meynell, 

It will give me great pleasure to hear of your health and con- 
tinued well-doing. I suspect the little boy will be christened 
Hugo, that being an ancient name in the Meynell family ; and the 
mention of the little boy is an additional reason why you should 
write to me before he comes. You will never write after, for the 
infant of landed estate is so precious, that he would exhaust the 
sympathies, and fill up the life, of seven or eight mothers. The 
usual establishment for an eldest landed baby is, two wet nurses, 
two ditto dry, two aunts, two physicians, two apothecaries ; three 
female friends of the family, unmarried, advanced in life ; and often, 
in the nursery, one clergyman, six flatterers, and a grandpapa ! 
Less than this would not be decent. 

We are all well, and keep large fires, as it behoveth those who 
pass their summers in England. 

I have not seen a living soul out of my family since I left London. 
It is some consolation to ■ think I have avoided the awkward 
dilemma about the Queen. I should have thought it base not to 
call, and yet 

My conjecture is that there will be no compromise, and that the 
Queen will be beaten out of the field. The chances against this 



t 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 419 

are that the King's nerves will give way. You do not know that 

is in the Green Bag. You thought him full of poetry alone, 

but gallantry and treason are in his composition. The Queen and 
her handmaids have been much exposed to the shafts of calumny 
on account of that too amiable and seducing fellow, who is at once 
a Lovelace and a Pope. Write me a line to show we are friends, 
and I will announce the event. 

Ever your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



190.] To Mrs Meynell. 

York, 1820. 
Dear Mrs Meynell, 

We have all been ill,— that is, all but I ;— a sort of fever ; and 
they have all been cured by me, for I am deeper in medicine than 
ever. 

Douglas is gone to school ; not with a light heart, for the first 
year of Westminster in college is severe : — an intense system of 
tyranny, of which the English are very fond, and think it fits a boy 
for the world ; but the world, bad as it is, has nothing half so bad. 

I strongly recommend you to read Captain Golownin's narrative 
of his imprisonment in Japan ; it is one of the most entertaining 

books I have read for a long time. You must also read — . 

I would let you off if I could, but my sense of duty will not permit 
me to do so ; for it is, and has long been, my province, to fit you 
up for London conversation ; Mrs Crape (your maid) dresses you 
—your other half falls to me. 

I hope your children are all well ; if they are not, I am sure you 
are not ; and if you are not, I shall not be so. So God bless you, 
my dear Gee ! and remember me kindly to your husband. 
Ever affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



191.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

February 2, 1821, 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I have read Southey, and think it so fair and reasonable a book, 
that I have little or nothing to say about it ; so that I follow your 
advice, and abandon it to any one who may undertake it. What I 
should say, if I undertook it, would be very unfavourable to 
Methodism, which you object to, though upon what grounds I 
know not. Of course Methodists, when attacked; cry out, "Infidel ! 
Atheist ! " — these are the weapons with which all fanatics and bigots 
fight ; but should we be intimidated by this, if we do not deserve 



4:o LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

it ? And does it follow that any examination of the faults of Dis- 
senters is a panegyric upon the Church of England ? But these 
are idle questions, as I do not mean to review it. I have written 
an article upon Dissenters' marriages, which I will send the moment 
I get some books from town. On other points I am stopped for 
books. 

I purpose sending you a short article upon the savage and 
illegal practice of setting spring-guns and traps for poachers. 
God bless you ! Your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



192.] To the Countess Grey. 

February 9, 1821. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

There is an end for ever of all idea of the Whigs coming into 
power. The kingdom is in the hands of an oligarchy, who see 
what a good thing they have got of it, and are too cunning and too 
well aware of the tameability of mankind to give it up. Lord 
Castlereagh smiles when Tierney prophesies resistance. His 
Lordship knows very well that he has got the people under for 
ninety-nine purposes out of a hundred, and that he can keep them 
where he has got them. Of all ingenious instruments of despotism, 
I most commend a popular assembly where the majority are paid 
and hired, and a few bold and able men, by their brave speeches, 
make the people believe they are free. 

Lord Lauderdale has sent me two pamphlets, and two hundred 
and thirty pounds of salt-fish. 

I hear you have taken a house in Stratford Place. The houses 
there are very good. You will be much more accessible than here- 
tofore. A few yards in London dissolve or cement friendship. 

Sydney Smith. 



193.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

Foston, Feb. 10, 1821. 
My dear Davenport, 
When shall you be in town ? There is an end for ever of all 
Whig Administrations. 

I am glad you agree with me about " Anastasius." I am writing 
an article in the Edinburgh Review against Squires for using 
spring-guns, and delicately insisting upon the usefulness of making 
two or three examples in that line. I have Southey's " Life of 
Wesley." To make a saleable book seems to have been a main 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 421 

consideration ; but it is not unreasonable, and is very well 
written. 

I have taken lodgings in York for myself and family during the 
Assizes, to enable them to stare out of the window, there being 
nothing visible where we live but crows. 

Mrs F , the liberty woman, is in York. There are several 

Scotch families staying there. No bad place for change, cheap- 
ness, and comparative warmth. 

Yours, dear Davenport, very sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 



194.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Foston, Feb. 12, 1821. 
Dear Mrs Meynell, 

I was very glad to receive your letter, and to find you were well 
and prosperous. 

The articles written by me in the Edinburgh Review are, that 
upon Ireland, and that upon Oxley's " Survey of Botany Bay." 

The Archbishop of York makes me a very good neighbour, and 
is always glad to see me. 

I agree with you that there is an end for ever of the Whigs 
coming into power. The country belongs to the Duke of Rutland, 
Lord Lonsdale, the Duke of Newcastle, and about twenty other 
holders of boroughs. They are our masters ! If any little oppor- 
tunity presents itself, we will hang them, but most probably there 
will be no such opportunity ; it always is twenty to one against the 
people. There is nothing (if you will believe the Opposition) so 
difficult as to bully a whole people ; whereas, in fact, there is 
nothing so easy, as that great artist Lord Castlereagh so well 
knows. 

Let me beg of you to take more care of those beautiful geraniums, 
and not let the pigs in upon them. Geranium-fed bacon is of a 
beautiful colour ; but it takes so many plants to fatten one pig, 
that such a system can never answer ! I cannot conceive who 
put it into your head. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



195.] To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, March 27, 1821. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
Nothing so difficult to send, or which is so easily spoilt in the 



422 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

carriage, as news. It was fresh, and seemed true, when you packed 
it up ; that is all you are answerable for. 

I shall be in town the 24th of April, and am very glad to find you 
are so near a neighbour. We have been at the Assizes at York for 
three weeks, where there is always a great deal of dancing and pro- 
vincial joy. 

I am very sorry the Hollands have left the pavement of London, 
because, when I come to London for a short time, I hate fresh air 
and green leaves, and waste of time in going and coming ; but I 
love the Hollands so much, that I would go to them in any spot, 
however innocent, sequestered, and rural. You have been in town 
a fortnight, and do not tell me to whom your daughters are going 

to be married. I suppose borrows the watchman's coat, and 

cries the hours up and down Stratford Place. How is Lord Grey? 
I hope you are on good terms with that eminent statesman, for you 
never mention his name. 

I am delighted with Hume and Creevy. You will have the good- 
ness to excuse me, but I am a Jacobin. I confess it, with tears in 
my eyes ; and I have struggled in secret against this dreadful pro- 
pensity, to a degree of which your loyal mind can have no idea. 
Do not mention my frailty even to my friend Lady Georgiana Mor- 
peth, but pity me, and employ a few minutes every day in con- 
verting me. 

Sincerely and affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



196.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Taunton, Aug. 7, 1821. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I have travelled all across the country with my family, to see my 
father, now eighty-two years of age. I w r ish, at such an age, you, 
and all like you, may have as much enjoyment of life ; more, you 
can hardly have at any age. My father is one of the very few 
people I have ever seen improved by age. He is become careless, 
indulgent, and anacreontic. 

I shall proceed to write a review of Scarlett's Poor Bill, and of 
Keppel Craven's Tour, according to the license you granted me ; 
not for the number about to come, but for the number after that. 
The review of the first will be very short, and that of the second 
not long. Length, indeed, is not what you have to accuse me of. 
The above-mentioned articles, with perhaps Wilks's Sufferings of 
the Protestants in the South of France, and the Life of Suard, will 
constitute my contribution for the number after the next {i.e.. the 
71st). 



LETTERS OF THE REV, SYDNEY SMITH. 423 

The wretchedness of the poor in this part of the country is very 
afflicting. The men are working for one shilling per day, all the 
year round ; and if a man have only three children, he receives no 
relief from the parish, so that five human beings are supported for 
little more than tenpence a day. They are evidently a dwindling 
and decaying race ; nor should I be the least surprised if a plague 
in the shape of typhus fever broke out here. 

Do me the favour to remember me to all my friends, and to 
number amongst those who are sincerely and affectionately at- 
tached to you, 

Sydney Smith. 

I beg my kind regards to Mrs Jeffrey, and to the little tyrant 
who rules the family. 



197.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

Lydiard, Taunton, August, 1821. 
Dear Davenport, 
Your letter followed, and found me here this day. You are right 
to see Dugald Stewart. I have seen nothing of him for ten or 
twelve years, but am very glad to give him such a token of my 
regard and goodwill as the introduction in question. Read the 
letter, blush, seal, and deliver ! 

There will be some distress for a year or two, but it will soon be 
over. Lay aside your Whiggish delusions of ruin ; learn to look 
the prosperity of the country in the face, and bear it as well as you 
can. 

The price of labour here all the year round is one shilling a day, 
and no parish relief unless the applicant has four children. The 
country is beautiful, and the common arts of life as they were in 
the Heptarchy. 

Ever yours, dear Davenport, very truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



198.] To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, Sept. 16, 1821. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
How do you all do ? Have you got the iron back ? Have you 
put it up ? Does it make the chimney worse than before ? for this 
is the general result of all improvements recommended by friends. 
A very wet harvest here ; but I have saved all my corn by in- 
jecting large quantities of fermented liquors into the workmen, and 
making them work all night. 

Sydney Smith. 



424 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

1 99-] To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, Nov. i, 1821. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Pray tell me how you are, and if you are making a good re- 
covery. I have long thought of writing, but feared you would be 
plagued by such sort of letters. 

An old aunt has died and left me an estate in London; this 
puts me a little at my ease, and will, in some degree, save me from 
the hitherto necessary, but unpleasant, practice of making sixpence 
perform the functions and assume the importance of a shilling. 

Part of my little estate is the Guildhall Coffee-house, in King 
Street, Cheapside. I mean to give a ball there. Will you come ? 

I am very sorry for poor Sir Robert Wilson. If he has been 
guilty of any indiscretion, I cannot see the necessity of visiting it 
with so severe a punishment. So much military valour might be 
considered as an apology for a little civil indiscretion ; but if no 
indiscretion has been committed, why, then publish in the papers 
a narrative of his whole conduct, from his getting up on that day, 
to his lying down. Let him pledge his word for its accuracy, and 
challenge denial and contradiction. This would turn the tables 
immediately in his favour. 

How is Lord Grey ? Is he good friends with me ? If he is, give 
him my very kind regards, and if he is not; for I never value people 
as they value me, but as they are valuable ; so pray send me an 
account of yourself, and whether you have got out of sago and 
tapioca into rabbit and boiled chicken. God send you may be 
speedily advanced to a mutton-chop ! 

Sydney Smith. 



200.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Foston, Nov. 11, 1821. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

Mr is a very gentlemanly, sensible man, and I was sure 

would tolerate me. My pretensions to do well with the world are 
threefold : — first, I am fond of talking nonsense ; secondly, I am 
civil; thirdly, I am brief. I may be nattering myself; but if I 
am not, it is not easy to get very wrong with these habits. 

The steady writing of Lord F 's frank indicates a prolonged 

existence of ten years. If a stroke to the / or a dot to the i were 

wanting, little might have some chance ; but I do not think 

a single Jew out of the Twelve Tribes would lend him a farthing 
upon post-obits, if he had seen my Lord's writing. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 425 

Agriculture is bowed down to the ground she cultivates ; the 
plough stands still, the steward's bag is empty, corn sells for 
nothing, but benevolent people will take it off your hands for a 
small premium. I do not abuse their good-nature ; but leave it to 
the natural, and now the only, animals that show any avidity for 
grain — the rats and mice. 

We are all anxious to hear something about you, and all recom- 
mend that it should be a girl. Kind regards to your husband and 
the baby. 

Sydney Smith. 



201.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Foston, Nov. 29, 1821. 
My dear Murray, 

To see the spectacle of honour conferred upon a man who 
deserves it, and he an old friend, is a great temptation, but I cannot 
yield to it. I must not leave home any more this year. 

In what state is the Review ? Is Scott's novel out ? Be so good 
as to ask, or say, if you know, in what odour the " Encyclopaedia 
Perthensis " is in Edinburgh. It has fallen to the inconceivably 
low price of seven guineas. I do not want an Encyclopaedia for 
dissertations and essays, but for common information ; — How is 
Turkey leather dyed? — What is the present state of the Levant 
trade, &c., &c. 

How little you understand young Wedgewood ! If he appears 
to love waltzing, it is only to catch fresh figures for cream-jugs. 
Depend upon it, he will have Jeffrey and you upon some of his 
vessels, and you will enjoy an argillaceous immortality. 

The rumours of to-day are, that the Ministry have given way to 
the King, and — Lord Conyngham is to be Chamberlain. Ever 
your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



202.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Foston, Dec. 20, 1821. 
My dear Lady Mary, 
In the first place I went to Lord Grey's, and stayed with them 
three or four days ; from thence I went to Edinburgh, where I had 
not been for ten years. I found a noble passage into the town, and 
new since my time ; two beautiful English chapels, two of the 
handsomest library-rooms in Great Britain, and a wonderful in- 
crease of shoes and stockings, streets and houses. When I lived 
there, very few maids had shoes and stockings, but plodded about 



426 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

the house with feet as big as a family Bible, and legs as large as 
portmanteaus. I stayed with Jeffrey. My time was spent with the 
Whig leaders of the Scotch bar, a set of very honest, clever men, 
each possessing thirty-two different sorts of wine. My old friends 
were glad to see me ; some had turned Methodists — some had lost 
their teeth— some had grown very rich — some very fat — some were 
dying — and, alas ! alas ! many were dead ; but the world is a coarse 
enough place, so I talked away, comforted some, praised others, 
kissed some old ladies, and passed a very riotous week. 

From Edinburgh I went to Dunbar, — Lord Lauderdale's — a 
comfortable house, with a noble sea-view. I was struck with the 
great good-nature and vivacity of his daughters. 

From thence to Lambton. And here I ask, what use of wealth 
so luxurious and delightful as to light your house with gas ? What 
folly, to have a diamond necklace or a Correggio, and not to light 
your house with gas ! The splendour and glory of Lambton Hall 
make all other houses mean. How pitiful to submit to a farthing- 
candle existence, when science puts such intense gratification within 
your reach ! Dear lady, spend all your fortune in a gas-apparatus. 
Better to eat diy bread by the splendour of gas, than to dine on 
wild beef with wax-candles ; and so good-bye, dear Lady. 

Sydney Smith. 



203.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

December 30, 1821. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

You must have had a lively time at Edinburgh from this 
" Beacon." But Edinburgh is rather too small for such explosions, 
where the conspirators and conspired against must be guests at the 
same board, and sleep under the same roof. 

The articles upon .Madame de Stael and upon Wilks's Protestants 
appear to me to be very good. The article upon Scotch Juries is 
surely too long. 

The " Pirate," I am afraid, has been scared and alarmed by the 
Beacon ! It is certainly one of the least fortunate of Sir Walter 
Scott's productions. It seems now that he can write nothing with- 
out Meg Merrilees and Dominie Sampson ! One other such novel, 
and there 's an end ; but who can last for ever ? who ever lasted so 
long ? 

We are ruined here by an excess of bread and water. Too much 
rain, too much corn ! 

God bless you, my dear friend ! 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 427 

204.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

March 17, 1822. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I had written three parts in four of the review I promised you of 
Miss Wright's book on America, and could have put it in your 
hands ten days since ; but your letter restricts me so on the sub- 
ject of raillery, that I find it impossible to comply with your condi- 
tions. There are many passages in my review which would make 
the Americans very angry, and — which is more to my immediate 
purpose — make you very loath to publish it ; and therefore, to 
avoid putting you in the awkward predicament of printing what 
you disapprove, or disappointing me, I withdraw my pretensions. 
I admire the Americans, and in treating of America, should praise 
her great institutions, and laugh at her little defects. The reasons 
for your extreme prudery I do not understand, nor is it necessary 
I should do so. I am satisfied that you are a good pilot of our 
literary vessel, and give you credit when I do not perceive your 
motives. 

I am at York. Brougham is here ; I have not seen him yet. 
Your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

205.] To Mrs Meynell. 

London^ May 10, 1822. 
Dear Mrs Meynell, 
I have got into all my London feelings, which come on the 
moment I pass Hyde Park Corner. I am languid, unfriendly, 
heartless, selfish, sarcastic, and insolent. Forgive me, thou in- 
habitant of the plains, child of nature, rural woman, agricultural 
female ! Remember what you were in Hill Street, and pardon 
the vices inevitable in the greatest of cities. 

They take me here for an ancient country clergyman, and think 
I cannot see ! ! . . . How little they know your sincere and affec- 
tionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

206.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, Jtine 22, 1822. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I understand from your letter that there only remains the time 
between this and the 12th of July for your stay in Edinburgh, and 



428 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

that then you go north ; this puts a visit out of the question at 
present. I think, when I do come, I shall come alone : I should 
be glad to show Saba a little of the world, in the gay time of Edin- 
burgh ; but this is much too serious a tax upon your hospitality, 
and upon Mrs Jeffrey's time and health ; and so there is an end of 
that plan. As for myself, I have such a dislike to say No, to any- 
body who does me the real pleasure and favour of asking me to 
come and see him, that I assent, when I know that I am not quite 
sure of being able to carry my good intentions into execution ; and 
so I am considered uncertain and capricious, when I really ought 
to be called friendly and benevolent. I will mend my manners in 
future, and be very cautious in making engagements. The first 
use I make of my new virtue is to say that I will, from time to time, 
come and see you in Edinburgh ; but these things cannot be very 
frequent, on account of expense, visits to London (where all my re- 
lations live), the injustice of being long away from my parish and 
family, my education of one of my sons here, and the penalties of 
the law. At the same time, I can see no reason why you do not 
bring Mrs Jeffrey and your child, and pay us a visit in the long 
vacation. We have a large house and a large farm, and I need 
not say how truly happy we shall be to see you. I think you ought 
to do this. 

Pray say, with my kind regards to Thomson, that I find it ab- 
solutely impossible to write such a review on the Cow Pox as will 
satisfy either him or myself for this number. I will write a review 
for the next, if so please him ; what sort of one it may be, the gods 
only know. I will write a line to Thomson. I will send you the 
Bishop if I can get him ready ; if not, certainly for the next 
number. I never break my word about reviews, except when I am 
in London. Pray forgive me ; I am sure your readers will. 

I read Cockburn's speech with great pleasure. I admire, in the 
strongest manner, the conduct of the many upright and patriotic 
lawyers now at the Scotch bar, and think it a great privilege to call 
many of them friends ; such a spectacle refreshes me in the rattery 
and scoundrelism of public life. 

Allen and Fox stopped here for a day. My country neighbours 
had no idea who they were ; I passed off Allen as the commentator 
on the Book of Martyrs. Ever affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



ioy.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Fosto?i, August, 1822. 
Dear Lady Mary, 
Many thanks for the venison, and say, if you please, what ought 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 429 

to be said to my Lord. It was excellent. I shall make a bow to 
Chillingham as I pass it on the stage-coach on my way to Scotland, 
where I am going to see my friend Jeffrey. 

I have had a great run of philosophers this summer ; — Dr and 
Mrs Marcet, Sir Humphry Davy, and Mr Warburton, and divers 
small mineralogists and chemists. Sir Humphry Davy was really 
very agreeable,— neither witty, eloquent, nor sublime, but reason- 
able and instructive. 

I remember the laughing we had together at C House ; and 

I thank God, who has made me poor, that he has made me merry. 
I think it a better gift than much wheat and bean land, with 
a doleful heart. 

I am truly rejoiced at the recovery of Duke John ; he is an 
honest, excellent person, full of good feelings and right opinions, 
and moreover a hearty laugher. I am glad to hear of the marriage 

of Mr Russell with Miss . The manufacture of Russells is a 

public and important concern. Adieu ! Affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



208.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Foston, Nov. 1, 1822. 
My dear Lady Mary, 

You will be sorry to hear that Douglas has had bad health ever 
since he went to Westminster, and has been taken thence to be 
nursed in a typhus fever, from which he is slowly recovering. Mrs 
Sydney set off for London last week, and is likely to remain there 
some time ; I find the state of a widower a very wretched one. 

Lady is unwell, and expects to be confined in February. 

The public is indebted to every lady of fashion who brings a fresh 
Whig into the world. It is a long time since you wrote to me ; the 
process by which I discover this is amusing enough. I feel uneasy 
and dissatisfied ; the turnips are white and globular — no blame im- 
putable to the farm — no Dissenters, no Methodists in the parish 
— all right with the Church of England ; and after a few minutes' 
reflection, I discover what it is I want, and seize upon it as the sick 
dog does upon the proper herb. 

I know never spares me, but that is no reason why I should 

not spare him ; I had rather be the ox than the butcher. 

Write to me immediately ; I feel it necessary to my constitution j 
and I am, dear Lady, 

Your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



430 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

209.] To Mrs Meynell. 

November, 1822. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

I think Adam Blair beautifully done— quite beautifully. It is 
not every lady who confesses she reads it ; but if you had been 
silent upon the subject, or even if you had denied it, you would have 
done yourself very little good with me. 

Our house is full of company : Miss Fox and Miss Vernon ; 
Mr and Mrs Spottiswode, with their children ; and Captain Gordon, 
an old and esteemed friend of mine. 

I hear from all your neighbours that you are much liked, but 
that they should not have supposed you had written so many 
articles in the Edinburgh Review as you are known to have done. 

God bless you, my dear friend ! Keep for me always a little 
corner of regard. 

Sydney Smith. 

210.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

Foston. 
My dear Lady Mary, 

I shall be obliged to you to procure for me Mr Rogers's verses 
upon the Temple of the Graces at Woburn : I thought them very 
pretty, and should be glad to possess them. 

Lord and Lady Grenville have been staying at Castle Howard, 
where we met them. Whatever other merits they have, they have 
at least that of being extremely civil "and well-bred ; good qualities 
which, being put into action every day, make a great mass of merit 
in the course of life. 

I am glad you liked what I said of Mrs Fry. She is very un- 
popular with the clergy : examples of living, active virtue disturb 
our repose, and give birth to distressing comparisons : we long to 
burn her alive. 

Who knows his secret sins ? I find, upon reference to Collins's 
Peerage, I have been in the habit for some months past of mis- 
spelling Lord TankervihVs name ; and you have left me in this 
state of ignorance and imperfection, from which I was awakened 
by a loud scream from Mrs Sydney, who cast her eye upon the 
direction of the letter, and saw the habitual sin of which I have 
been guilty. 

On account of the scarcity of water, many respectable families in 
this part of the world wash their faces only every other day. It is 
a real distress, and increasing rather than diminishing. God bless 
you! 

Your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 431 

211.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

No date. 
My dear Friend, 

I am not in London, but on my way to it, at Holland House. 
The person taken for me is a very fat clergyman, but not I. So 
singular a letter as yours I never saw. You say, " I shall be on 

the banks of the Thames till Tuesday, after that at C House, 

but before Tuesday you will find me at the Privy Garden." Can 
you thus multiply yourself? If you can, pray let me have a copy of 
you at Foston ; and pray, dear Lady Mary, let it be well clone, and 
very much like the original ; not a hasty sketch, but minute ; — and 
take no liberties with the pencil. The great merit of a copy is 
fidelity. 

I should have been glad to renew my acquaintance with the 
Edgeworths. 

Sydney Smith. 



212.] To Lady Mary Bennett. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Mary, 

Having written what I had to write on Small Pox and the Bishop 
of Peterborough, I wish to discuss Mr Biggs's R.eport of Botany 
Bay. Mr Bennett was so good as to offer me the loan of his Report ; 
if he remain in the same gracious intentions towards me, will you 
have the goodness to desire him to send it by return of post ? 

I have been making a long visit to my friends in the neighbour- 
hood of Manchester. Their wealth and prosperity know no bounds: 
I do not mean only the Philippi, but of all who ply the loom. 
They talk of raising corps of manufacturers to keep the country 
gentlemen in order, and to restrain the present Jacobinism of the 
plough ; the Royal Corduroys — the First Regiment of Fustian— 
the Bombazine Brigade, &c. &c. 

I have given the Bishop of Peterborough a good dressing. What 
right has anybody to ask anybody eighty-seven questions ? and tell 
me (this is only one question) what agreeable books I am to read. 
I hear of a great deal of ruin in distant countries ; there is none 
here, but then the soil is good. 

Your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



432 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

213.] To Lady Wenlock. 

Foston, Dec. ir, 1822. 
My dear Madam, 
Wo will keep ourselves clear of all engagements the first week of 
the new year, and in readiness to obey your summons for any day 

of it. I care not whom I meet, provided it is not Sir , and to 

invite anybody to meet him would be a very strong measure. Sir 
William and Lady Gordon are very agreeable people, and indeed I 
should be ashamed of myself if I were not a good deal captivated 
by her ; but upon that point I have nothing to reproach myself 
with. Lewis, I suppose, was hastening on to the Treasury, with 
the accumulation of guilty jobs that he had discovered in Scotland ; 
he will make a very faithful servant to the public for two or three 
years, beyond which period it would be a little unreasonable per- 
haps to expect the duration of his public virtues. 

I remain, my dear Madam, very truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



214.] To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, Jan. 31, 1823, 
Dear Lady Grey, 

About half after five in the evening (three feet of snow on the 
ground, and all communication with Christendom cut off) a chaise 
and four drove up to the parsonage, and from it issued Sir James 
and his appendages. His letter of annunciation arrived the fol- 
lowing morning. Miss Mackintosh brought me your kind reproaches 
for never having written to you ; to which I replied, " Lord and 
Lady Grey know very well that I have a sincere regard and affec- 
tion and respect for them, and they will attribute my silence only 
to my reluctance to export the stupidity in which I live." 

I am so very modest a man, that I am never afraid of giving my 
opinion upon any subject. Pray tell me if you understand this sort 
of modesty. There certainly is such a species of that virtue, and 
I claim it. But whether my claim is just or unjust, my opinion is, 
that there will be some repeals of heavy taxes, and a great deal of 
ill-humour, — probably a Whig Administration for a year,— no re- 
form, no revolution : if no Whig Administration, Canning in for 
about two years, till they have formed their plans for flinging him 
overboard : Canning to be conciliatory and laudatory for about 
three months, and then to relapse : prices to rise after next harvest. 

You have read " Peveril ; " a moderate production between his 
best and his worst ; rather agreeable than not. 



LETTERS OE THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 433 

I hope you have read and admired Doblado. To get a Catholic 
priest who would turn King's evidence is a prodigious piece of good 
luck ; but it may damage the Catholic question. 

Lord Grey has, I hear, been pretty well. I was called up to 
London a second time this year, and went to Bowood, where I spent 
a very agreeable week with the Hollands, Luttrell, Rogers, &c. It 
is a very cheerful, agreeable, comfortable house. 

We have a good deal of company in our little parsonage this 

year ; — all pure Whigs, if I may include in this number. That 

young man will be nothing but agreeable ; enough for any man, if 

his name were not , and if the country did not seem to have 

acquired an hereditary right to his talents and services. 

God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! Kindest regards to Lord Grey 
and your children, from your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

Mackintosh had seventy volumes in his carriage ! None of the 
glasses would draw up or let down, but one ; and he left his hat 
behind him at our house. 



215.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Eoston, Feb. 18, 1823. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

You are quite right about happiness. I would always lay a 
wager in favour of its being found among persons who spend their 
time dully rather than in gaiety. Gaiety — English gaiety — is seldom 
come at lawfully ; friendship, or propriety, or principle, are sacri- 
ficed to obtain it ; we cannot produce it without more effort than it 
is worth ; our destination is, to look vacant, and to sit silent. 

My articles in the last number are, the attack on the Bishop of 
Peterborough, and on Small Pox. If you do not know what to 
think of the first, take my word that it is merited. Of the last you 
may think what you please, provided you vaccinate Master and 
Miss Meynell. 

I am afraid we shall go to war : I am sorry for it. I see every 
day in the world a thousand acts of oppression which I should like 
to resent, but I cannot afford to play the Quixote. Why are the 
English to be the sole vindicators of the human race ? Ask Mr 
Meynell how many persons there are within fifteen miles of him 
who deserve to be horsewhipped, and who would be very much 
improved by such a process. But every man knows he must keep 
down his feelings, and endure the spectacle of triumphant folly and 
tyranny. 

2 E 



434 LETTERS OF THE REW SYDXEY SMITH. 

Adieu, my dear old friend. I shall be very glad to see you again, 
and to witness that happiness which is your lot and your due; two 
circumstances not always united. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith; 



216.] To the Countess Grey. 

Fostou, York, Feb. 19, 1823. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

In seeing my handwriting again so soon, you will say that your 
attack upon me for my indisposition to letter- writing has been more 
successful than you wished it to be ; but I cannot help saying a 
word about war. 

For God's sake, do not drag me into another war ! I am worn 
down, and worn out, with crusading and defending Europe, and 
protecting mankind ; I must think a little of myself. I am sorry 
for the Spaniards — I am sorry for the Greeks — I deplore the fate of 
the Jews ; the people of the Sandwich Islands are groaning under 
the most detestable tyranny ; Bagdad is oppressed ; I do not like 
the present state of the Delta; Thibet is not comfortable. Am I to 
fight for all these people ? The world is bursting with sin and 
sorrow. Am I to be champion of the Decalogue, and to be 
eternally raising fleets and armies to make all men good and 
happy ? We have just done saving Europe, and I am afraid the 
consequence will be, that we shall cut each other's throats. Xo 
war, dear Lady Grey ! — no eloquence ; but apathy, selfishness, 
common sense, arithmetic ! I beseech you, secure Lord Grey's 
swords and pistols, as the housekeeper did Don Quixote's armour. 
If there is another war, life will not be worth having. I will go to 
war with the King of Denmark if he is impertinent to you, or does 
any injury to Howick : but for no other cause. 

" May the vengeance of Keaven ,; overtake all the Legitimates of 
Verona i but, in the present state of rent and taxes, they must be 
left to the vengeance of Heaven. I allow fighting in such a cause 
to be a luxury ; but the business of a prudent, sensible man, is to 
guard against luxury. 

I shall hope to be in town in the course of the season, and that I 
shall find your health re-established, and your fortune unimpaired 
by the depredations of Lady Ponsonby at piquette. To that excel- 
lent lady do me the favour to present my kind remembrances and 
regards. 

"Doblado's Letters " are by Blanco White of Holland House. 
They are very valuable for their perfect authenticity, as well as for 
the ability with which they are wTitten. They are upon the state of 
Spain and the Catholic religion, previous to the present revolution. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 435 

The line of bad Ministers is unbroken. If the present will not 
do, others will be found as illiberal and unfriendly to improvement. 
These things being so, I turn my attention to dinners, in which I 
am acquiring every day better notions, and losing prejudices and 
puerilities ; but I retain all my prejudices in favour of my hosts of 
Howick, and in these points my old age confirms the opinions of 
my youth. Your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



217.] To John Allen, Esq. 

March 3, 1823. 
Dear Allen, 

I beg your pardon for my mistake, but I thought you had written 
constantly in the Review ; and, so thinking, I knew Spanish sub- 
jects to be familiar to you. 

Upon the absurd and unprincipled conduct of the French there 
can be but one opinion ; still I would rather the nascent liberties of 
Spain were extinguished than go to war to defend them. I am 
afraid these sentiments will displease you, but I cannot help it. 
We fight in this case either from feeling or prudence. If from 
feeling, why not for Greece ? why not for Naples ? why not for the 
Spanish colonies ? If from prudence, better that Spain and Por- 
tugal were under the government of Viceroy Blacas or Chateau- 
briand, than that we should go to war. 

I object to your dying so soon as you propose ; I hate to lose old 
and good friends. I am not sure that we could find the same brains 
over again. I am not churchman enough to wish you,away. We 
will live and laugh for thirty years to come. Yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



218.] To Lady Holland. 

Foston, July 11, 1823. 
Dear Lady Holland, 
Hannibal would not enter Capua. I have got back all my rural 
virtues. Would it be prudent to demoralise myself twice in a season 
by re-entering the metropolis ? I will stop short at the Green Man 
at Barnet, and venture no farther. Yours, 

S. S. 



436 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

219.]. To Lady Holland. 

October 1, 1823. 
Dear Lady Holland, 
I was prepared to set off for London, when a better- account 
arrived from Dr Bond. I think you mistake Bond's character in 
supposing he could be influenced by partridges. He is a man of 
very independent mind, with whom pheasants at least, or perhaps 
turkeys, are necessary. 

Nothing can be more disgusting than an Oratorio. How absurd, 
to see five hundred people fiddling like madmen about the Israelites 
in the Red Sea ! Lord Morpeth pretends to say he was pleased, 
but I see a great change in him since the music-meeting. Pray 
tell Luttrell he did wrong not to come to the music. It tired me to 
death ; it would have pleased him. He is a melodious person, and 
much given to sacred music. In his fits of absence I have heard 
him hum the Hundredth Psalm ! (Old Version.) 

Ever yours, dear Lady, 

Sydney Smith. 



220.] To Lady Holland. 

October 19, 1823. 

We have been visiting country squires. I got on very well, and 

am reckoned popular. We came last from . Mrs 

and I begin to be better acquainted, and she improves. I hope / 
do ; though, as I profess to live with open doors and windows, I am 
seen (by those who think it worth while to look at me) as well in 
five minutes as in five years. 

I distinguished myself a good deal at M. A. Taylor's in dressing 
salads ; pray tell Luttrell this. I have thought about salads much, 
and will talk over the subject with you and Mr Luttrell when I have 
the pleasure to find you together. 

I am rejoiced at the Duke of Norfolk's success, and should have 
liked to see Lord Holland's joy. A few scraps of victory are thrown 
to the wise and just in the long battle of life. 

I could have told before that bark would not do for the Duke 
of Bedford. What will do for him is, carelessness, amusement, 
fresh air, and the most scrupulous management of sleep, food, and 
exercise ; also, there must be friction, and mercury, and laughing. 

The Duchess wrote me a very amusing note in answer to mine, 
for which I am much obliged. All duchesses seem agreeable to 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDXEY SMITH. 437 

clergymen ; but she would really be a very clever, agreeable woman, 
if she were married to a neighbouring vicar ; and I should often 
call upon her. 

Dear Lady Holland, your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



221.] Written on the first page of a Letter of his youngest 
Daughter to her friend Miss . 

Foston, 1823. 
Dear little Gee, 
Many thanks for your kind and affectionate letter. I cannot 
recollect what you mean by our kindness ; all that I remember is, 
that you came to see us, and we all thought you very- pleasant, 
good-hearted, and strongly infected with Lancastrian tones and 
pronunciations. God bless you, dear child ! I shall always be very 
fond of you till you grow tall, and speak without an accent, and 
marry some extremely disagreeable person. 

Ever very aftectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



222.] To Mrs Meynell. 

About 1823. 
• •»•«••• 

No pecuniary embarrassments equal to the embarrassments of a 

professed wit, like Mr : an internal demand upon him for 

pleasantry, and a consciousness, on his part, of a limited income 
of the facetious ; the disappointment of his creditors, — the impor- 
tunity of duns, — the tricks, forgeries, and false coin he is forced to 
pay instead of gold ! 

Pity a wit, and remember with affectio n your stupid friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



223.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

Foston, Aug. 28, 1824. 
My dear Davenport, 
I did not write one syllable of Hall's book. When first he 
showed me his manuscript, I told him it would not do ; it was too 
witty and brilliant. He then wrote it over again, and I told him 
it would do very well indeed ; and it has done very well. He is a 
very painstaking person. 

I am very sorry I have not a single copy left of my first Assize 
Sermon, I thought I had sent you a copy : I would immediately 



.138 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

send you another if I had one to send. You will see an article of 
mine in this Review, No. 80, upon America. Lady Suffolk's 
Letters, in No. 79, were reviewed by Agar Ellis. 

I hear your sister is going with a multitude of Berrys and Lind- 
says to Scotland. I hope she will be retained if we get leave to 
visit your papa. 

Yours, my dear Davenport, very truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



224.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

September 23, 1824. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
If you mean that my article itself is light and scanty, I agree to 
that ; reminding you that lightness and flimsiness are my line of 

reviewing. If you mean that my notice of M 's book is scanty, 

that also is true ; for I think the book very ill done : still, it is done 
by an honest, worthy man, who has neither bread nor butter. 
How can I be true under such circumstances ? 

Sydney Smith. 



225.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

October 1, 1824. 
My dear Davenport, 

I am very sorry there should be any mistake as to the day ; but 
in the negotiation between the higher powers — Mrs Davenport and 
Mrs Sydney — the day mentioned was from the 15th to dinner, till 
the morning of the 17th. You will smile at this precision ; but I 
find, from long experience, that I am never so well received, as 
when I state to my host the brief duration of his sorrows and 
embarrassments. Upon the same principle, young speakers con- 
ciliate favour by declaring they do not mean to detain the House 
a long time. 

Great expectations are formed of your speech. The report is, 

that you apostrophise the shades of Hampden and Brutus. 

has a beautiful passage on the effects of freedom upon calico. Sir 
John Stanley will take that opportunity of refuting Locke and 

Malebranche ; it will be a great day, J W will speak of 

economy from the epergne. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 439 

226.J To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, Oct. 23, 1824. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I am just come from a visit to Lord Fitzwilliam, that best of old 
noblemen ! I was never there before. Nothing could exceed his 
kindness and civility. The author of the " Paradise Lost M was 
there also. I am surprised that I had heard so little of the magni- 
ficence of Wentworth House. It is one of the finest buildings I 
ever saw — twice as great a front as Castle Howard ! And how 
magnificent is the hall ! 

I took Fouche's Memoirs for genuine ; but I have nothing to 
refer to but ignorant impressions. 

Dear Lady M ! I have more tenderness for Lady M 

than it would be ecclesiastical to own ; but don't mention it to 
Lord Grey, who is fond of throwing a ridicule upon the cloth. In 

the meantime, Lady M is the perfection of all that is agreeable 

and pleasant in society. 

I have sent to Bishop Doyle a list of errors commonly and un- 
justly imputed to the Catholics, and more and more believed for 
want of proper contradiction, requesting him to publish and 
circulate a denial of them signed by the Roman Catholic hier- 
archy. It would be a very useful paper for general circulation. 
He writes word it shall be done. God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! 

Sydney Smith. 



227.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston^ Nov. 10, 1824. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
I will send you a sheet for this number upon allowing Counsel 
for Prisoners in cases of Felony. Your review of the Bumpists 
destroys them, but it is tremendously long for such a subject. I 
cannot tell what the Scotch market may require, but Bumpology 
has always been treated with great contempt among men of sense 
in England, and the machinery you have employed for its destruc- 
tion will excite surprise ; though everybody must admit it is ex- 
tremely well done. 

A good article upon the Church of England, and upon the Court 
of France, and in general a very good number. Ever, my dear 
Jeffrey, most sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



44o LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

228.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

November^ 1824. 
My dear Davenport, 

Political economy has become in the hands of Malthus and 
Ricardo, a school of metaphysics. All seem agreed what is to be 
done ; the contention is, how the subject is to be divided and de- 
fined. Meddle with no such matters. Write the lives of the prin- 
cipal Italian poets, of about the same length as Macdiarnnd's 
" Lives," mingling criticism and translation with biography : this is 
the task I assign yon. 

The Berrys are slowly rising in this part of the world ; I hear of 
them eighty miles off, and their track begins to be pointed out. 
People are out on the hills with their glasses. I have written to 
ask them to Foston. Our visit succeeded very well at Knowsley. 
The singing of the children was admired, and we all found Derbus 
and Derbe very kind and attentive. What principally struck me 
was the magnificence of the dining-room, and the goodness of 
heart both of the master and mistress ; — to which add, the ugliness 
of the country ! 

I am sorry to hear you are likely to have the gout again. Let it 
be a comfort to you to reflect, that I, who have no gout, have not 
an acre of land upon the face of the earth. 

Sydney Smith. 

No Roman vase : we are not worthy — it is out of our line. I 
have read over your letter again. If the object in writing essays on 
political economy is to amuse yourself, of course, there can be no 
objection ; but my opinion is (and I will never deceive in literary 
matters) you will do the other much better. If you have a mind 
for a frolic over the mountains, you know how glad I shall be to 
see you. 



229.] To Lord Crewe. 

About 1824. 
Dear Lord Crewe, 

I cannot help writing a line to thank you for your obliging note. 
I hope one day or other (wind and weather permitting) to pay my 
respects to Lady Crewe and you, at Crewe Hall, of goodly exterior, 
and, like a York pie, at this season filled with agreeable and inter- 
esting contents. 

To Mr and Mrs Cunliffe my kind remembrances, if you please, 
I cannot trust myself with a message to Mrs Hopwood, but shall be 
very much obliged to your Lordship to frame one, suitable to my 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 441 

profession, worthy of its object, and not forgetful of my feelings ; 
let it be clerical, elevated, and tender. 

P 's single turnips turned out extremely well ; he is about to 

publish a tract " On the Effect of Solitude on Vegetables." 
I remain, dear Lord Crewe, very truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



230.] To Lord Holland. 

Foston, July 14, 1825. 

We stayed two days with Lord Essex, and were delighted with 
Cashiobury. I think you and I might catch some fish there next 
summer. He darkens his house too much with verandahs, and 
there are no hot luncheons ; in return, he is affable, open-hearted, 
unaffected, and good-humoured in the highest degree. I am sorry 
I never went there before. I will always go in future when I can, 
and when I am asked. 

The northern world is profoundly peaceful and prosperous ; the 
reverse of everything we have prophesied in the Edinburgh Review 
for twenty years. 

Sydney Smith. 

231.] To Lady Holland. 

August 25, 1825. 

has been extremely well received, and is much liked. His 

nature is fine : he wants ease, which will come, and indiscretion, 

which will never come. I had a visit from the Earl of to my 

great surprise. I must do him the justice to say that nothing could 
be more agreeable and more amiable. To him succeeded some 
Genevese philosophers; not bad in the country, where there is 
much time and few people, but they would not do in London. 

My sermon, which I send you, was printed at the request of the 
English Catholic Committee. 

I do not like Madame Benin : I suspect all such books. You 
will read a review of mine, of Bentham's " Fallacies," in the next 
Edinburgh Review. 

The general report here is, that is to marry the King of 

Prussia. I call it rather an ambitious than a happy match. It will 
neither please Lord Holland, nor Allen, nor Whishaw. 
Your sincere and affectionate 

Sydney Smith. 



442 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

232.] To the Countess Grey. 

Newcastle^ Oct. 4, 1825. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

I have been on a visit to Brougham, where I met Mackintosh. 
We had a loyal week, and spoke respectfully of all existing 
authorities. A pretty place ; Brougham very pleasant ; Mackintosh 
much improved in health. Mrs Brougham is a very fine old lady, 
whom I took to very much. 

From Brougham I went to Howard of Corby, — an excellent 
man, believing in the Pope ; and from thence I proceeded to Ord's, 
over the most heaven-forgotten country I ever saw. Ord lives in 
this very beautiful, inaccessible place at the end of the world, very 
comfortably. 

I now write from a vile inn at Newcastle, where I can get neither 
beef, veal, nor sealing-wax. 

I have a great prejudice against soldiers, but thought Mr ■ 

agreeable, and with a good deal of humour. I am very much 
pleased that the Howards intend to live on at Castle Howard : 
they are very excellent people, and I am most fortunate in having 
such neighbours. 

S. S. 



233.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Fosto?i, 1825. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I addressed a letter to you ten days since, mentioning some sub- 
jects which, if agreeable to you, I would discuss in the Edinburgh 
Review. I know the value and importance of your time enough to 
make me sorry to intrude upon you again ; but the printer, you 
know, is imperious in his demands, and limited in his time. Will 
you excuse me for requesting as early an answer as you can ? It 
must be to you, as I am sure it is to me, a real pleasure to see so 
many improvements taking place, and so many abuses destroyed ; 
— abuses upon which you, with cannon and mortars, and I with 
sparrow-shot, have been playing for so many years. 

Mrs Sydney always sends you reproaches for not coming to see 
her as you pass and repass ; but I always reply to her, that the 
loadstone has no right to reproach the needle for not coming from 
a certain distance. The answer of the needle is, " Attract me, and 
I will come ; I am passive." " Alas ! it is beyond my power," says 
the magnet. " Then don't blame me," says the needle. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 443 

234.] To the Countess Grey. 

January, 1826. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Terrible work in Yorkshire with the Pope ! I fight with the 
beasts at Ephesus every day ! 

I hope you have lost no money by the failures all around you. 
I have been very fortunate. In future I mean to keep my money 
in a hole in the garden. 

This week I publish a pamphlet on the Catholic question, with 
my name to it. There is such an uproar here, that I think it is 
gallant, and becoming a friend of Lord Grey's (if he will forgive the 
presumption of my giving myself that appellation), to turn out and 
take a part in the affray. I would send you a copy, but it would cost 
you three times as much as to buy it. But the best way is neither 
to buy nor receive it. What a detestable subject ! — stale, thread- 
bare, and exhausted ; but ancient errors cannot be met with fresh 
refutations. 

They say it is very cold, but I am in a perfectly warm house ; 
and when I go out, am in a perfectly warm great-coat : the seasons 
are nothing to me. 

I wish Lord Howick would come and see me, as he passes and 
repasses : I am afraid he doubts of my Whig principles, and thinks 
I am not for the people. You know that Dr Willis opposes Beau- 
mont for the county of Northumberland. The sheriff has provided 
himself with a strait waistcoat. 

How did you like Lord Morpeth's answer? It seems to me 
modest, liberal, and rational. It is very generally approved here. 
It is something, that a young man of his station has taken the 
oaths to the good cause. 

Pray tell all your family the last person burnt in England for 
religion was Weightman, at Lichfield, by the Protestant Bishop of 
Lichfield and Coventry, in the reign of James the First, 161 2. God 
save the King ! 

From your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



235.] To the Earl Grey. 

February 16, 1826. 

My dear Lord Grey, 

There appeared, in the "Monthly Magazine" (January), and 

was thence copied into several papers, " A Letter of Advice to 

the Clergy, by the Rev. Sydney Smith." It is a mere forgery ; and 

I have ascertained that the author is a Mr Nathaniel Ogle, of 



444 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Southampton. May I beg the favour of you to inform me who 
Mr Nathaniel Ogle is ? I thought Nat Ogle, the eldest son of the 
Dean, had been dead, and that the estate had passed to John. If 
you know anything of this gentleman, I should be obliged to you to 
inform me, and also to send me the address of the Rev. Henry 
Ogle. Any attack of wit or argument is fair ; but to publish letters 
in another man's name is contra bonos mores, and cannot be 
allowed. I hope you are well, and bring with you to town a lady 
as well as yourself. 

I have published a pamphlet in favour of the Pope, with my 
name, which I would send, but that it would cost you more than 
its price, being above weight, and sine pondere : but I cannot help 
writing ; facit indignatio versus. Most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



236.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, Feb. 28, 1826. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I can make nothing of Craniology, for this reason : they are taking 
many different species of the same propensity, and giving to them 
each a bump. Now I believe that if nature meant to give any 
bumps at all, it must have been to the genus, and not to the 
species and varieties ; because the human skull could not contain 
outward sings of a tenth part of the various methods in which any 
propensity may act. But to state what are original propensities, 
and to trace out the family or genealogy of each, is a task requiring 
great length, patience, and metaphysical acuteness ; and Combe's 
book is too respectably done to be taken by storm.' 

Instead of this, I will send you, as you seem pressed, the review 
of " Granby," a novel of great merit. Stop me, by return of post, 
if this book is engaged, and believe me always most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



237.] To Fletcher, Esq. 

York, March 25, 1826. 
My dear Sir, 
I am truly glad that any effort of mine in the cause of liberality 
and toleration meets with your approbation. You have lived a life 
of honour and honesty, truckling to no man, and disguising no 
opinion you entertained. I think myself much honoured by your 
praise. I will take care you have a copy of my speech as soon as I 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 445 

return to Foston from York, where I am now staying for a short 
course of noise, bad air, and dirt. 

My letter is by this time nearly out of print : a thousand copies 
have disappeared, and I am printing another thousand ; and I will 
take care you have one from the author, as a mark of his sincere 
regard and respect. 

God bless you, my dear Sir ! I wish you a fertile garden, a 
warm summer, limbs without pain, and a tranquil mind. The 
remembrance of an honourable and useful life you have secured 
for yourself already. Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



238.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Ship Inn, Dover* April 14, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 

I have arrived safely at Dover, and shall cross to-morrow in the 
Government packet. You must direct to me at Messrs Laffitte and 
Co., Paris. You need only write once a week, except in case of 
accidents ; I shall write, as I told you, every day. I think, when 
we go to Paris, I shall set off in the steamboat from London. 

The road from London to Dover is very beautiful. I am much 
pleased with Dover. They have sunk a deep shaft in the cliff, and 
made a staircase, by which the top of the cliff is reached with great 
ease ; or at least what they call great ease, which means the loss of 
about a pound of liquid flesh, and as much puffing and blowing as 
would grind a bushel of wheat. The view from the cliff, I need not 
tell you, is magnificent. 

I dare say a number of acquaintances will turn up. You shall 
have an exact account of the contents of the steam-packet. God 
bless you all ! 

S. S. 

* "These letters, perhaps, are not of sufficient interest to be worthy of general atten- 
tion. Yet they show the pleasure he took in imparting to the absent the daily incidents 
occurring to him in a new place, and the promise gratuitously given, and never once 
departed from, that he would write ever)' day. He well knew how eagerly these letters 
would be read at home. Thef-looking at everything with a view to the enjoyment he 
should have in taking his family abroad at some future time, — his mindfulness of all the 
little commissions given him, — show him to have been as full of unostentatious domestic 
virtue, as he was conspicuous for that which is deemed greater and nobler. — C. A. S."— 
Note to the Letters from Paris, by Mrs Sydney Smith. 

The brief extracts which have been selected from the letters written by Mr Sydney 
Smith to his wife, during his first visit to Paris, are not inserted for their brilliancy, nor 
because they inform us of anything about Paris with which we are not familiar. I think 
them precious, as showing his fresh and open sense of enjoyment, and his eager desire to 
share it with his family. The words in italics were underlined in the copies made by Mrs 
Sydney, and so I have left them : I would not rob them of the emphasis given to them 
by her proud and grateful affection.— Ed. 



446 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

239.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Calais, April 15, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 

I am writing from a superb bedroom and dressing-room, at 
Dessein's. I wanted to order dinner, and a very long carte, of 
which I understood nothing, was given me ; so I ordered "Potage 
aux choux" (God knows what it is), " Pommes de terre au nature!," 
and " Veau au naturel." I am afraid I shall have a fortune to pay 
for it. 

I have been walking all about Calais, and am quite delighted 
with it. It contains about half the population of York. What 
pleases me, is the taste and ingenuity displayed in the shops, and 
the good manners and politeness of the people. Such is the state 
of manners, that you appear almost to have quitted a land of bar- 
barians. 

I wish you could see me, with my wood fire, and my little bed- 
room, and fine sitting-room. My baggage has passed the Custom- 
house without any difficulty ; therefore, so far, my journey has 
answered perfectly. 

You shall all see France ; I am resolved upon that. God bless 
you all, 

S. S. 



240.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris : no date. 
Dearest Wife, 

My dinner at Calais was superb ; I never ate so good a dinner, 
nor was in so good an hotel ; but I paid dear. I amused myself 
that evening with walking about the streets of Calais, which pleased 
me exceedingly. It is quite another world, and full of the greatest 
entertainment. I most sincerely hope, 07ie day or another, to con- 
duct you all over it; the thought of doing so is one of my greatest 
pleaszires in travelling. I was struck immediately with, and have 
continued to notice ever since, the extreme propriety and civility 
of everybody, even the lowest person ; I have not seen a cobbler 
who is not better bred than an English gentleman. I slept well 
on a charming bed, after having drunk much better tea than I 
could have met with in England. 

I found the inns excellent everywhere on the road, and the 
cookery admirable. The agriculture appeared to me extremely 
good ; the instruments very clumsy, and the sheep, cows, and pigs 
miserable. The horses admirable for agriculture and seven miles 
an hour. At Paris I drove to several hotels, and could not get ad- 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 447 

mission ; at last I found rooms at the Hotel D'Orvilliers. I dined 
in a cafe" more superb than anything we have an idea of in the way 
of coffee-house, and I send you my bill. A dinner like this would 
have cost thirty shillings in London. At this coffee-house I was 
accosted by Binda, who was dining there. My dinner was not 
good, for, not knowing what to choose, and not understanding the 
language of the kitchen, I chose the first thing upon the list, and 
chose badly ; it is reckoned the best coffee-house in Paris. 

In the morning I changed my lodgings to the Hotel Virginie, 
Rue St Honord, No. 350. My sitting-room is superb ; my bed- 
room, close to it, very good ; there is a balcony which looks upon 
the street. — as busy as Cheapside ; in short, I am as comfortably 
lodged as possible : I pay at the rate of £2, 2s. per week. I am 
exceedingly pleased with everything I have seen at the hotel, and 
it will be, I think, here we shall lodge. God bless you all ! 

Sydney Smith. 



241.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris, April 19, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 

I called on the Duke of Bedford, who took me for Sir Sidney 
Smith, and refused me ; I met him afterwards in the street. 

I have bought a coat-of-arms on a seal for six shillings, which 
will hereafter be the coat-of-arms of the family ; this letter is sealed 
with it.* 

I called upon Dumont, who says that our hospitality to his 
friends has made us very popular at Geneva, and that M. Chauvet 
gave a very entertaining account of us. 

Paris is very badly lighted at nights, and the want of a trottoir 
is a very great evil. The equipages are much less splendid and 
less numerous than in England. The Champs Elysees are very 
poor and bad ; but, for the two towns, m spite of all these incon- 
veniences, believe me, there is not the smallest possibility of a 
comparison ; Regent Street is a perfect misery, compared with the 
finest parts of 'Paris. I think, in general, that the display of the 
shops is finer here than in London. 

Of course my opinions, from my imperfect information, are likely 
to change every day ; but at present I am inclined to think that I 
ought to have gone, and that we will go, to the Boulevards. 

There are no table-cloths in the coffee-houses ; this annoys me ; 
(at least none for breakfast.) I am very well ; still a little heated 

* Vide Memoir, Chapter VIII. 



448 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

with the journey. I have written regularly every day. God bless 
you all ! 

Sydney Smith. 

April 20. 
The Duke of Bedford wrote me a note, saying there had been 
some mistake on the day I called, — that I had been mistaken for 
my namesake, — "as much unlike you as possible." This note was 
carried to Sir Sydney, who opened it, read it, and returned it to 
me, with an apology for his indiscretion, offering to take me to 
some shows, and begging we might be acquainted. 

S. S. 



242.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris, April 21, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 

I breakfasted yesterday with Miss Fox and Miss Vernon. I met 
an ancient member of the National Assembly — a M. Girardin, a 
sensible, agreeable man, who gave me an introduction to-day to 
the Assembly, of which I mean to avail myself. 

I dined with Lord Holland ; there was at table Barras, the ex- 
Director, in whose countenance I immediately discovered all the 
signs of blood and cruelty which distinguished his conduct. I 
found out, however, at the end of dinner, that it was not Barras, 
but M. de Barante, an historian and man of letters, who, I believe, 
has never killed anything greater than a flea. The Duke de Broglie 
was there ; I am to breakfast with him to-morrow. In the after- 
noon came Casimir Perrier, one of the best speakers in the As- 
sembly, and Dupin, a lawyer. I saw young Abercromby here, the 
Secretary of Legation. 

Lady Granville has invited me to her ball, which is to be, as they 
say, very splendid. 

I have hired a laquais de place, who abridges my labour, saves 
my time, and therefore my money. I am assailed by visitants, 
particularly by Sir Sydney Smith, who is delighted with my letter 
to him, and shows it about everywhere. 

God bless you all ! 

S. S. 



243.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris, April 22, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 
From Montmartre there is a noble panorama of Paris. From 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 449 

thence I went to the Assembly of Deputies, — a dark, disagreeable 
hall. I was placed so far from them that I could not hear. They 
got up and read their speeches, and read them like very bad par- 
sons. I dined at seven o'clock at the Ambassador's ; Miss Fox 
carried me there. The company consisted of Lord and Lady 
Granville, Lady Hardy (Sir Charles Hardy's lady), Mr and Mrs 
Ellis, Lady C. Wortley, Mr Sneyd, Mr Abercromby, and two or 
three attache's ; and in the afternoon came a profusion of French 
duchesses, — in general very good-looking, well-dressed people, with 
more form and ceremony than belongs to English duchesses. The 
house was less splendid than I expected, though I fancy I did not 
see the state apartments. There is an assembly there this morn- 
ing, to see the greenhouses and gardens, to which I am invited : you 
know my botanic skill — it will be called into action this morning ; 
to-morrow I am going to a dejetiner ct la fourchette with the Duke 
de Broglie. 

I have renewed my acquaintance with young . There is 

something in him, but he does not know how little it is ; he is much 
admired as a beauty. 

God bless you all ! I have written every day. 

S. S. 



244.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris > April 23, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 

I went yesterday with Dumont to breakfast with the Duke de 
Broglie. The company consisted of the Duke, the Duchess, the 
tutor, young Rocca, M. de Stael, brother to the Duchess, and the 
children. The Duke seems to be a very amiable, sensible man. 
He and M. de Stael are going to make a tour, and I think will 
come to see us in Yorkshire. 

After breakfast I went to see the palace of the Duke of Orleans. 
The pictures are numerous, but principally of the French school, 
and not good ; the rooms in which there are no pictures are most 
magnificent ; in short, magnificence must be scratched out of our 
dictionary. I then went to a dejeiiner a, la fourchette at the Ambas- 
sador's, where there was a numerous assembly of French and 
English ; it was a very pretty sight in a very pretty garden. 

I dined with Lord Bath. In the evening we went to see Mdlle. 
Mars, the great French actress. Her forte is comedy : she seems 
to excel in such parts as Mrs Jordan excelled in, and has her 
sweetness of voice. She is very old and ugly ; she excels also in 
genteel comedy, ns Miss Farren did. I certainly think her a very 
considerable actress. 

2 F 



45o LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

After the play I went to Lady Holland's, where was Humboldt, 
the great traveller, — a lively, pleasant, talkative man. 

I like M. Gallois very much ; he is a truly benevolent, amiable 
man. I have not yet had a visit from the hero Sir Sidney Smith ; 
it is his business to call upon me, and I am not anxious to make 
acquaintance with my countryman. 

God bless you ! I have written every day, but have received no 
letters ! 

S. S. 

245.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris, April 27, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 

Yesterday was a very bad, draggling day, and Paris is not 
pleasant at such a time. I went to the King's Library, containing 
four hundred thousand volumes ; they are lent out, even the manu- 
scripts, and, I am afraid, sometimes lost and stolen. It is an enor- 
mous library, but nothing to strike the eye. I then saw the Palais 
du Prince de Conde, which is not worth seeing. 

I dined with Lord Holland, who is better. The famous Cuvier 
was there, and in the evening came Prince Talleyrand, who renewed 
his acquaintance with me, and inquired very kindly for my brother. 
I mean to call upon him. The French manners are quite opposite 
to ours : the stranger is introduced, and I find he calls upon the 
native first. This is very singular, and, I think, contrary to reason. 

In the evening I went to Lady Granville's ball ; nothing could be 
more superb. It is by all accounts the first house in Paris. I met 
there crowds of English. Madame de Bourke, the widow of the 
late Danish Ambassador, renewed her acquaintance with me. The 
prettiest girl in the room was Miss Rumbold, the daughter-in-law 
of Sir Sidney Smith. 

The French Government are behaving very foolishly, flinging 
themselves into the arms of the Jesuits ; making processions through 
the streets, of twelve hundred priests, with the King and Royal 
Family at their head ; disgusting the people, and laying the foun- 
dation of another revolution, which seems to me (if this man* lives') 
to be inevitable. God bless you ! 

S. S. 



246.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris, April 28, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 
Yesterday was a miserable day ; it rained in torrents from morn- 

* Charles X. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 451 

ing to night. I employed the morning in visiting in a hackney- 
coach. It is curious to see in what little apartments a French 
savant lives ; you find him at his books, covered with snuff, with 
a little dog that bites your legs. 

I had no invitation to dinner, so dined by myself at a coffee-house. 
I improve in my knowledge of Paris cookery. There were four 
English ladies dining in the public coffee-house, — very well-bred 

women. In the evening I received an invitation from Mrs H. S 

to go with her and her son to the Opera. I went, and was pleased 
with the gaiety of the house ; there is no ballet, and at present no 
good singer. The house was full of English, who talk loud, and 
seem to care little for other people ; this is their characteristic, and 
a very brutal and barbarous distinction it is. After the Opera, I 
went to drink tea with Mrs S , and so ended my day. 

This morning it is snowing. I am going to breakfast with the 
Duke de Broglie. God bless you all ! 

S. S. 



247.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris, April 29, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 
Horrible weather again to-day ; snowing and raining all day. I 
went to breakfast -with the Duke de Broglie. They are virtuous, 
sensible people, but give breakfasts without a table-cloth ! 

I saw the Palace of the Luxembourg and the House of Peers ; 
bad pictures, fine gardens, and the noblest staircase in Paris. The 
Luxembourg gardens are very fine for the French style of garden- 
ing, which I confess I like very much. I am going to-morrow with 
Mr Sneyd to St Cloud and Meudon. A fortnight is sufficient for 
any man to see Paris perfectly, if he meets with no friends and is 
diligent. 

S. S. 

248.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris, May 1, 1826. 

Saturday was again a horrible day. I have been badly advised 
about the time of year: the month of May is the time. We will 
set off from Yorkshire the 1st of May. 

I dined with Talleyrand ; his cook is said to be the best in Paris. 
The Duke of Bedford took me there. He was very civil (Talley- 
rand, I mean), as was his niece, the Duchess de Dino. I sat near 
Mr Montron, the Luttrell of Paris, a very witty, agreeable man, 



452 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

with whom I made great friends. In the afternoon I went to Lady 
Grantham's, where was a splendid assembly. I amused myself 
very much, and stayed till twelve o'clock. I renewed my acquaint- 
ance with Pozzo di Borgo, the Russian Ambassador, a very sensible, 
agreeable man. 

S. S. 



249.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

Paris, May 4, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 

I was engaged all yesterday in seeing the procession. The King 
laid the first stone of a statue to Louis XVI. in the Place de Louis 
XV. The procession passed under my window, where were Miss 
Fox, Miss Vernon, Lady Holland, and others. There were about 
twelve hundred priests, four cardinals, a piece of the real Cross, 
and one of the nails, carried under a canopy upon a velvet cushion ; 
the King, the Marshals, the House of Peers, and the House of 
Commons following. A more absurd, disgraceful, and ridiculous, 
or a finer, sight, I never saw. The Bourbons are too foolish and 
too absurd ; nothing can keep them on the throne. 

The season is very cold ; it is a decided east wind to-day. I am 
fully a month too soon ; the foliage is not half out. 

You know Mrs H. S . On Sunday, when I preached, she sat 

near Sir Sidney Smith ; he commended the sermon very much. 

11 Yes," said Mrs S , " I think it should make you proud of 

your name ! " You may easily guess how this was relished. 

I am a good deal alarmed by these riots in England, because I 
do not know how they are to end. There is a want of work ; when 
will the demand for manufacturing labour revive ? How is it pos- 
sible to support such a population in idleness ? 

The King is grown dreadfully old since I dined with him at the 
Duke of Buccleuch's, in Scotland ; I should not have known him 
again. There are some hopes of the Dauphin and of the Duchess 
d'Angoulerne. If some change does not soon take place, there will 
be a revolution. God bless you all ! 

S. S. 



250.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

May 5, 1826. 
Dearest Kate, 
I went yesterday to the. Cimetiere du Pere la Chaise. This is a 
large burying-ground of two hundred acres, out of Paris. The 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 453 

tombs are placed in little gardens by the relations, and covered 
with flowers. You see people mourning and weeping over the 
graves of their friends. I was much pleased and affected with it. 

From thence I went to the Castle of Vincennes, two or three 
miles from Paris. It was here that the Duke d'Enghien was shot 
by order of Buonaparte. A monument, in very bad taste, is erected 
to his memory in the chapel. The castle is not inhabited, but by 
artillerymen ; it is a sort of bad Woolwich. The park is immense; 
at first they would not let me in, but a sergeant of artillery, who 
was showing it to his friends, admitted me to be of the party. It is 
not however worth seeing, — only worth driving round. 

I went to dine with Mr and Mrs Greathed. They gave me a very 
good dinner, particularly a filet de becuf ■piqu'e of admirable flavour 
and contrivance. There was a gentleman, whose name I could not 
learn, nor ascertain his nature ; and a very agreeable, clever woman, 
by the name of Ouesnel, the widow of Holcroft, who writes for the 
stage here ; she has six children by her first, and six by her second 
husband, and she says she is called at her hotel la dame aux enfans! 
God bless you all ! 

S. S. 



251.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

May 7, 1826. 

I passed three hours yesterday at the police, getting my passport. 
I think I have nearly seen all my sights. I have seen Sismondi 
and Madame Sismondi this morning ; he is an energetic and sen- 
sible old man. My two reviews are very much read, and praised 
here for there fun ; I read them the other night, and they made me 
laugh a good deal. 

The Parisians are very fond of adorning their public fountains : 
sometimes water pours forth from a rock, sometimes trickles from 
the jaws of a serpent. The dull and prosaic English turn a brass 
cock, or pull out a plug ! What a nation ! 

I have bought the " Cuisinier Bourgeois." I think we may at- 
tempt one or two dishes. We shall not be perfect at first, but such 
an object will ensure and justify perseverance. I meant, when 
first I came, to have bought all Paris : but, finding that difficult, J 
have, for myself, only spent six shillings ! 

S. S. 



454 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

252.] To Mrs Sydney Smith. 

London, Friday. 
Dearest Kate, 

I set off at nine o'clock on Tuesday in the diligence, with a 
French lady and her father, who has an estate near Calais. I 
found him a sensible man, with that propensity which the French 
have for explaining things which do not require explanation. He 
explained to me, for instance, what he did when he found coffee 
too strong ; he put water in it ! He explained how blind people 
found their way in Paris, — by tapping upon the wall with a stick ; 
what he principally endeavoured to make clear to me was, how 
they knew when they were come to a crossing ;— it was when there 
was no longer a wall to strike against with their stick ! I expressed 
my thorough comprehension of these means used by blind men, 
and he paid me many compliments upon my quickness. I had fine 
weather for my journey, and arrived at Calais at four o'clock on 
Wednesday. I went to Quilliac's Hotel, which I found less good 
and less dear than that of Dessein. 

I went to the play the day before I came away, and saw Talma. 
He is certainly a very fine actor, making due allowance for the 
vehemence and gesticulation of the French. 

What has struck me most is the extraordinary beauty of the 
French papers. I have bought enough to paper your room for 
£2, 10s. ; the duty upon it was £5 ; total, £7, iar., about as cheap 
as English paper at a shilling a yard ; but I see no such patterns 
in England. 

We sailed at about eleven o'clock, and had a beautiful passage 
of less than three hours. A sea-voyage produces a little terror, 
some surprise, great admiration, much cold, much ennui, and, 
where there is no sickness, much hunger. I got my things through 
the Custom-house here before six o'clock, and travelled all night to 
London, with a Flemish baron, his lady, and child, and a French 
physician's wife. I am very little fatigued. And so ends my 
journey to France, which has given me much pleasure and amuse- 
ment. God bless you all ! 

S. S. 



253.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Foston, July, 1826. 
Dear Jeffrey, 
Will you allow me to remind, you that it is above three weeks 
since I asked you whether I might write an article upon licensing 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 455 

ale-houses, — a great English subject ? I should take it as a favour 
if you would answer these queries as soon as you can, by a single 
word, as follows : — 

Ale-houses — Yes. 

Ale-houses — No. 
The impediment to the nnder-workmen is serious, when tne master 
will not tell them what they arc to do. Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



254.] To Lady Holland. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I was very glad to hear you were so well as to despise the south 
of France, and remain at Paris. 

The Duke of Devonshire told me everything would go on as 
usual at Castle Howard. Lord Morpeth is very much liked wher- 
ever he has presented himself, and appears to be sure of his election. 
The Protestants are very angry that four Papists should be elected, 
but they have not as yet brought forward any Martin Luther 
against us. 

Little Du Cane has been here ; a very amiable pleasing person. 

I shall ask for his defects ; they are not apparent at a first 

acquaintance. Lord (innocent lamb !) has been distributing 

cake and wine to the little children of , and presiding at the 

Bible Society. If he take to benevolence, he will be the happier 
for it. 

Have you read "Matilda"? If you have, will you not tell me 
what you think of it ? You are as cautious as Whishaw. I 
mentioned to Lord Normanby that it was the book selected as a 
victim for the next number of the Edinburgh Review, and that my 
brethren had complimented me with the knife. Lady Normanby 
gave a loud shriek ! 

All the branches of the Howards are at Castle Howard. The 
music went off very well ; ,£20,500 was collected. I did not go 
once. Music for such a length of time (unless under sentence of 
a jury) I will not submit to. What pleasure is there in pleasure, 
if quantity is not attended to as well as quality ? I know nothing 
more agreeable than a dinner at Holland House ; but it must not 
begin at ten in the morning and last till six. I should be incapable 
for the last four hours of laughing at Lord Holland's jokes, eating 
Raffaelle's cakes or repelling Mr Allen's attacks upon the Church. 

Sydney Smith. 



456 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

255.] To Lord Holland. 

August % t 1826. 

It struck me last night, as I was lying in bed, that Mackintosh, 
if he were to write on pepper, would thus describe it — 

" Pepper may philosophically be described as a dusty and highly 
pulverised seed of an oriental fruit ; an article rather of condiment 
than diet, which, dispersed lightly over the surface of food with no 
other rule than the caprice of the consumer, communicates pleasure, 
rather than affords nutrition ; and, by adding a tropical flavour to 
the gross and succulent viands of the North, approximates the 
different regions of the earth, explains the objects of commerce, 
and justifies the industry of man." 

I am very glad to hear from Miss Vernon, that you are all so 
well, and that you are enjoying yourselves so much at Ampthill. 

S. S. 



256.] To the Countess Grey. 

Fosto7i, September, 1826. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

We have had Mr Whishaw and Mr Jeffrey here, and a number 
of very sensible, agreeable men, coming up to the imperfect idea I 
am able to form of good society. You have had a brisk time of it 
at Howick, and all the organs of combativeness have been called 
into action. I hope you are cooling. We have been, ever since I 
have been here, in the horror of elections — each party acting and 
thinking as if the salvation of several planets depended upon the 
adoption of Mr Johnson and the rejection of Mr Jackson. 

I think it is the hot weather which has agreed with you ; it is 
quite certain that it has not agreed with me. I never suffered so 
much from any species of weather ; but I am, you know, of the 
family of Falstaff. 

Pray make all my friends (meaning by that expression your 
daughters) study languages on the Hamiltonian method. 

I hope you found Howick in high beauty. It must have been an 
affecting meeting. You left it under the conviction that you would 
see it no more, though I told you all the time you would live to be 
eighty. 

Pray read Agar Ellis's " Iron Mask," not so much for that 
question, though it is not devoid of curiosity, as to remark the 
horrible atrocities perpetrated under absolute monarchies ; and to 
justify and extol Lord Grey, and at the humblest distance, Sydney 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 457 

Smith and other men, who, according to their station in life and 
the different talents given them, have defended liberty. 
God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! 

From your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



257.] To Lady Holland. 

London, Thursday, 1826. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
I have written to Maltby, and stated (in order to accumulate 
motives) that you are a considerable scholar, but shy, and must be 
pressed a good deal before you develop such-like knowledge ; 
particularly, that you have peculiar opinions about the preterpluper- 
fect tense ; and this, I know, will bring him directly, for that tense 
has always occasioned him much uneasiness, though he has 
appeared to the world cheerful and serene. 

But how little we know of what passes in each other's minds ! 
Ever yours, 

S. S. 

258.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Foston, Nov. 9, 1826. 
Dear Allen, 

Pray tell me something about Lord and Lady Holland, as it is 
several centuries since I have seen them. I was in the same house 
in Cheshire with ; , but he was too ill to see me ; extreme depres- 
sion of spirits seems to be his complaint, an evil of which I have 

a full comprehension ; Mrs seems to be really alarmed about 

him. Have you finished your squabbles with Lingard ? The 
Catholics are outrageous with you, and I have heard some of the 
most violent express a doubt whether you are quite an orthodox 
member of the Church of England. 

I never saw Lord Carlisle looking so well. Is not happiness good 
for the gout ? I think that remedy is at work upon him. I cannot 
say how r agreeable their neighbourhood is to me. I am very glad 
to see Mackintosh is really at work upon his history : it will im- 
mortalise him, and make Ampthill classical from recollections. 

I think of going to Edinburgh in the spring with my family, on a 
visit to Jeffrey, who was with us in the summer. Health and 
respect, dear Allen ! Prosperity to the Church, and power to the 
clergy 1 

Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



tf« LETTERS OE THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

We have seen a good deal of old Whishaw this summer : he is 
as pleasant as he is wise and honest. He has character enough to 
make him well received if -he were dull, and wit enough to make 
him popular if he were a rogue. 



259.] To Edward Davenport, Esq. 

December 26, 1826. 
Dear Davenport, 

I wish you would turn your talents and activity to oppose this 
odious war. There is no such thing as a "just war," or, at least, 
as a wise war ; at all events, this is not one. Pray be pacific. I 
see you have broken the ice in the House of Commons. I shall be 
curious to hear your account of your feelings, of what colour the 
human creatures looked who surrounded you, and how the candles 
and Speaker appeared. We must have a small massacre of magis- 
trates ; nothing else will do. The gentleman you have mentioned 
shall be among the first. 

I wish you had added a word of the nature and condition of my 

old friend Mrs H : breeding, of course ; at least, the onus 

frobandi is with her. 

We hear nothing here but of distress bazaars, and the high price 
of hay. I am not without alarm as to the state of the country : the 
manufacturing distress has lasted too long. 

For God's sake, open upon the Chancery. On this subject there 
can be no excess of vituperation and severity. Advocate also free 
trade in ale and ale-houses. Respect the Church, and believe that 
the insignificant member of it who now addresses you is most truly 
yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



260.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

Hoivick, February, 1827. 
My dear Jeffrey, 
It appears there is a great probability of war with Spain, and 
therefore with France. If the majority had been in favour of the 
Catholics, Peel and Lord Bathurst had settled to resign. Of this 
there is no doubt, Lord Liverpool regains neither speech nor reason, 
only a little power of locomotion ; his resignation has been given 
in by his friends. The King has taken the most decided part 
against the Catholics, and begs he may never more be importuned 
respecting a question which harasses his conscience ; he pleads 
even his Coronation Oath. 






LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 459 

There is a great effort made by the High Tories to fling Canning 
overboard, but Peel is averse to try the experiment. But for this, 
it is supposed he would be dismissed. The alternative, I take to 
be, either Peel, or Canning, bound hand, foot, and tongue. Lord 
Wellington openly declares Canning to be, from his indiscretion, 
unfit for office. 

I have not heard the slightest rumours of Lord Grey or Lord 
Lansdowne. 

You affectionate friend, 
Sydney Smith. 

261.] To Mrs Fletcher. 

York, March, 1827. 
My dear Madam, 

Many thanks for your obliging note, and for the loan of the 
books. I really must persevere in my judgment of Tone's conduct. 
His life had been spared by the Irish Government, who are 
generous enough to let him off with no other condition than that of 
expatriation ; and the moment their generosity has set him free, he 
plots their destruction by calling in a foreign enemy. I must hold 
this to be bad morals. A tone of vulgarity pervades the whole 
narrative ; yet, if the first error in morals be overlooked, there is 
devotion, heroism, courage, and perseverance in his conduct. 

My sermons were little or nothing ; their excellence is in your 
own desire to excel, and in your disposition to be pleased. 

Politics, domestic and foreign, are very discouraging ; Jesuits 
abroad — Turks in Greece — No-Poperists in England ! A panting 
to burn B ; B fuming to roast C ; C miserable that he cannot 
reduce D to ashes ; and D consigning to eternal perdition the 
three first letters of the alphabet. 

Health and respect ! 

Sydney Smith. 

262.] To the Earl Grey. 

March 24, 1827. 
My dear Lord, 

It would have some effect, if the Catholics were to admit the 
expediency of excluding every member from voting on the affairs 
of the Church, who would not take the declaration against Tran- 
substantiation. The common query is, Are they to assist in regu- 
lating the affairs of our Church, who will not permit us to meddle 
with their Church ? 

I remain, my dear Lord, with our kind regards, most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



460 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

263.] To the Translator of Voltaire's " Charles XIL" 

Foston, York ^ April 24, 1827. 
Madam,* 
I am extremely obliged by the honour you have done me in 
sending me your translation of " Charles XII." I have no reason 
to alter my opinion expressed in the Edinburgh Review ; all you 
have written confirms to me the benefit of the double translation. 
Anything that can be done to alleviate the wretchedness of learning 
languages, is of the highest public importance. I will look over 
your translation ; and, if anything occurs to me deserving of your 
consideration, will write to you through the medium of your 
publishers. I remain, Madam, your well-wisher and obedient 
servant, 

Sydney Smith. 



264.] To the Dean of Chester. 

Foston, June 28, 1827. 
My dear Sir, 

I can only say, that if any man asked me whether I was the 
author of an anonymous publication, in which his character was 
attacked, that I would immediately (if I were the author) own my- 
self to be so, and publish his defence with my own assent to, or 
dissent from it, accompanied by my reasons ; and, if I thought I 
had done wrong, I would apologise. This is the plain course ; and 

this course I dare say (if he be the author) will pursue. I 

shall have occasion to write to him and Jeffrey soon, and will state 
to them the same opinions I have stated to you. 

As to the old quarrel with the Edinburgh Review, and who was 
right and who was wrong, you will, I am sure, have the goodness to 
excuse me for not saying anything on the subject ; twenty years 
have elapsed, and the thing is dead and gone. You and I, like 
wise and respectable men, have shaken hands, and so ends the 
matter. 

I have not read youi sermon. I received a letter from London 
about the time it was published, taking a view of it as a decided 
anti-Catholic sermon, and desiring me to review it. I immediately 
declined doing so ; and as I had the wisdom to keep out of the origi- 

* About the time at which this letter was written, public attention had been drawn to 
the so-called Hamiltonian System of interlinear translation, by an article in the 
Edinburgh Review. The book here referred to was translated anonymously by the 
Editor of these Letters ; and as this toilsome work was undertaken partly in conse- 
quence of the eulogy of the system contained in that article, a copy was sent to the 
author of it. It was not till long afterwards that he knew to whom his letter wag 
addressed.— Ed. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 461 

nal war, I have a fair right to remain neutral in the secondary 
dispute, and must therefore deny myself the pleasure I should 
derive from any production of yours. 

You have done quite right in writing to me. You may depend 

upon it I will exhort (if he be the author) to reconsider his 

remarks, and to do you all the justice he conscientiously can. I 
have written nothing whatever in the approaching number of the 
Edinburgh Review. 

Upon looking over your letter again carefully, I perceive you do not 
contend that your sermon, to a certain extent, is not anti-Catholic, 
but that you have always been anti-Catholic to the same extent ; if 
so, this is, of course, a perfect answer to the charge of inconsistency. 
I have unfortunately seen so little of you for many years past, that 
I can have no knowledge of your opinions ; but I had formed a 
loose notion that you had been a decided friend to Catholic Eman- 
cipation, and it certainly would have surprised me (as it seems to 
have surprised ) to have read from you a sermon so anti- 
Catholic as you represent yours to be. I thought I had heard that 
you were almost alone in the Convocation defending the Catholics. 
But these are mere rumours of the streets ; I have no kind of 
authority for them. 

I write in haste ; pray construe my letter in the spirit of kindness 
and goodwill, or if you doubt me, or whether you doubt me or not, 
come to Foston and try me. Yours, dear Sir, very truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



265.] To Mrs Meynell. 

July, 1827. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 
The worst political news is, that Canning is not well, and that 
the Duke of Wellington has dined with the King. Canning dead, 
Peel is the only man remaining alive in the House of Commons ; 
— I mean, the only man in his senses. 

The article on the new Ministry is by ; violent, but there is 

considerable power in it. 

I hope to be able to make good my excursion in the autumn, but 
it is doubtful ; we have some thoughts of going to Scarborough. 
It seems to me as if you wanted sea air and bathing. Persuade 
Mr Meynell of this. He is a very affectionate husband ; and if you 
look ill and don't eat, he will immediately consent : so come to 
Scarborough, dear G. 

Your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith, 



462 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

266.] To Messrs , Booksellers, . 

Foston, Jtdy 30, 1827. 
Gentlemen, 

I have received from you within these few months some very 
polite and liberal presents of new publications ; and, though I was 
sorry you put yourselves to any expense on my account, yet I was 
flattered by this mark of respect and goodwill from gentlemen to 
whom I am personally unknown. 

I am quite sure however that you overlooked the purpose and 

tendency of a work called , or that you would not have sent it 

to a clergyman of the Established Church, or indeed to a clergy- 
man of any church. I see also advertised at your house a transla- 
tion of Voltaire's " Philosophical Dictionary." I hope you will have 
the goodness to excuse me, and not to attribute what I say to an 
impertinent, but a friendly, disposition. Let us pass over, for a 
moment, all those much higher considerations, and look at this 
point only in a worldly view, as connected with your interests. Is 
it wise to give to your house the character of publishers of infidel 
books ? The English people are a very religious people, and those 
who are not hate the active dissemination of irreligion. The zealots 
of irreligion are few and insignificant, and confined principally to 
London. You have not a chance of eminence or success in that 
line ; and I advise you prudently and quietly to back out of it. 

I hate the insolence, persecution, and intolerance which so often 
pass under the name of religion, and (as you know) I have fought 
against them ; but I have an unaffected horror of irreligion and im- 
piety ; and every principle of suspicion and fear would be excited 
in me by a man who professed himself an infidel. 

I write this from respect to you. It is quite a private communi- 
cation, and I am sure you are too wise and too enlightened to take 
it in evil part. 

I was very much pleased with the " Two Months in Ireland," but 
did not read the poetical part ; the prosaic division of the work is 
very good. 

I remain, Gentlemen, yours faithfully, 

Sydney Smith. 



267.] To Lady Holland. 

November 6, 1827. 
Dear Lady Holland, 
I was very sorry to hear from Mrs Robert Smith that you were 
indisposed at Cheam. These three — November, December, and 
January — are the unhappy months. I do not expect a moment's 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 463 

happiness before the 1st of February. Cheam was built (as it is 
now ascertained) by Chemosh, the abomination of the Moabites. 
I think it is one of the worst and most incurable places I ever saw, 
but if it amuses poor Bobus it was not created in vain. 

You know these matters better than I ; but my conjecture is that 
Lord Grey will go into regular opposition, or at least very soon slide 
into if. Whatever his intentions may be at the beginning, nobody 
heats so soon upon the road. 

Jeffrey has been here with his adjectives, who always travel with 
him. His throat is giving way ; so much wine goes down it, so 
many million words leap over it, how can it rest ? Pray make him 
a judge ; he is a truly great man, and is very heedless of his own 
interests. I lectured him on his romantic folly of wishing his 
friends to be preferred before himself, and succeeded, I think, in 
making him a little more selfish. 

I have never ceased talking of the beauty of Ampthill, and in 
those unmeasured terms of which Mary accuses me. I am afraid 
I do deal a little sometimes in superlatives, but it is only when I 
am provoked by the coldness of my fellow-creatures. You see my 
younger brother, Courtenay, is turned out of office in India, for 
refusing the surety of the East India Company ! Truly the Smiths 
are a stiff-necked generation, and yet they have all got rich but I. 
Courtenay, they say, has ^15 0,000, and he keeps only a cat ! In 
the last letter I had from him, which was in 1802, he confessed that 
his money was gathering very fast. 

S. S. 



[268.] 
[This diverting letter requires some explanations, which Mr 
Howard, of Corby, has been kind enough to furnish. I give it in 
his own words. — Ed.] 

"The following letter is not dated, but the frank of Lord Morpeth, 
'Malton, November 22, 1827/ supplies the omission; it was ad- 
dressed to me shortly after we had met Mr Sydney Smith and Sir 
James Mackintosh at Brougham Hall. The disquisition which 
gave rise to it was a sequel of some conversation on the subject. 
It was entitled : — 

u ' Account of some of the Roman Legions and Cohorts stationed on 
and near the Roman Wall, with a Geographical Reference to the 
places from whence they came. 

" ' PREFATORY REMARKS. 

" ' The policy of the Romans, who governed one conquered nation 
by the powers of another, and made use of the turbulent and refrac- 



464 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

tory subjects of one part of their empire to keep the others in sub- 
jection, was very fully evinced by the garrisons on the Roman Wall 
(which was the northern extremity of their possessions) being com- 
posed of troops from all nations, even the most southern extremity 
of their dominions. 

"'Thus we see Numidian Moors, and troops from the most dis- 
tant southern regions, brought to shiver in the bleakest parts of 
Cumberland and Northumberland.' 

" N.B — An enumeration of the different Numidian, Hungarian, 
Thracian, and other legions, found by records to have been 
stationed at the forts along the Roman Wall, was given in proof of 
the foregoing remarks : to which Mr Sydney Smith sent the sub- 
joined reply." 

To Philip Howard, Esq., Corby Castle. 

Foston, Saturday. 
My dear Sir, 

My opposition to the Numidian Colony is, I assure you, not lurk- 
ing, but salient and luminous, and founded upon a research, I must 
say, rather wider than your own. In the first place, I object to 
your geographical description of Mauritania, and rather suspect 
you have followed the geographers of the school of Ptolemy, — at 
least, so I should suspect, from your erroneous notions of the con- 
fines of Mauritania. Upon this subject let me beg you to consult 
the learned Barkius " De Rebus Mauritaniensibus," fol. Bat. 1672 ; 
Pluker's " Africa," cap. 2, sec. 3 ; the " Mauritania" of Viger, Paris, 
1679, quarto ; and the " Africa Vulgata" of Scoppius. Baden, the 
famous Dutch scholar, fell into the same error with yourself, but 
was properly chastised in the " Badius Flagellatus," now become a 
very scarce book, but which you may certainly borrow from Mr 
Archdeacon Wrangham. 

Are you acquainted with the dissertation of Professor la Manche, 
than which, Gibbon says, " nothing more copious and satisfactory 
ever issued from the French press ? ; ' The perusal of these works 
will, I think, give you new ideas upon the eastern division of the 
Syrtis. Abalaba can have nothing possibly to do with the Africans. 

has shown this word to come from Abal, the lord of the British 

chiefs. Blakarus, or Barkarus, cannot be African words ; for Ton- 
nericus " De Rebus Africanis," and Crakius " De Linguis Occi- 
dentalibus," have shown, in all the languages of that coast, the 
total absence of the vowels a and u, and have even produced great 
and reasonable doubts of e } i, and 0. The Emperor Gordian could 
not have been crowned at Tidrus. Nobody could imagine that, 
who for an instant had inspected and studied the late discoveries 
brought to light in the Phelian marbles. The province of Byzacum 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 465 

proper does not lie to the south of Tunis ; you are mistaking it for 
ryzacum. The first signifies, in the ancient Coptic, head of fire, 
whereas Fyzacum signifies red with wheat. 

I could go on for an hour, pointing out the mistakes into which a 
spirit of hypothesis has plunged your excellent understanding. I 
end with seriously advising you to read Gait and Porringer ;* and, 
if you are not then cured of this kind of theory, I must pronounce 
you, my dear Mr Howard, to be incurable. Ever yours very truly, 

Sydney Smith. 



269.] To the Countess Grey. 

Edinburgh, 1827. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
You are so kind, that I am sure you will be glad to hear that 
Mrs Sydney bore the rest of her journey well, though she is not 
yet off the sofa. 

Dr Thomson advises as follows for you : — 

Broiled meat at breakfast, an egg, and chocolate. 

At twelve, a basin of rich soup. 

At two, a meat luncheon and a tumbler of porter. 

A jelly at four. 

Dinner at six ; four or five glasses of claret. 

Tea and a whole muffin. 

Hot supper and negus at ten. 

Something nourishing at the side of your bed. 

I have been to-day to an exhibition of Scotch portraits. High 
cheek-bones are not favourable to the fine arts. 

I found it dreadfully cold from Alnwick to Edinburgh. My 
companions were a captain of a man-of-war and a sherry merchant 
from Cadiz. My vendor of sherry told me that all the accounts of 
Ferdinand's sending regiments were most absurd ; that he could 
no more send men than send angels ; that he was not devout ; that, 
in fact, the Spanish nation did not exist ; that the French and the 
monks in the south of Spain were most unpopular ; that the 
people at large ardently desired a Constitution ; and that he had 
sherry at all prices from £27 to £$7 per butt. 

And so, dear Lady Grey, God bless you ! Read cheerful books, 
play at cards, look forward two hours, and believe me always most 
truly yours, Sydney Smith. 

* "Gait, de Colon. Roman." Venet 1672; and Porringer's celebrated treatise of 
" Mare nee liberum r.ec clausum ;" the London, not the Scotch edition. 

2 G 



466 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

270.] To the Countess Grey. 

Foston, Jan. 4, 1828. 

We were married on New Year's Day,* and are gone/ I feel as 
if I had lost a limb, and were walking about with one leg, — and 
nobody pities this description of invalids. How many amputations 
you have suffered ! Ere long, I do not think you will have a leg 
to stand on. 

Kind regards to my Lord and my friends your daughters ; as 
many years to you all as you wish for yourselves. Your affection- 
ate friend, Sydney Smith. 



271.] From Lady Lyndhurst. 

George Street \ Jan. 24, 1828. 
My dear Mr Smith, 
My husband has just informed me that he has nominated you to 
a vacant stall at Bristol ; and he was willing that I should have the 
pleasure of first communicating to you this good news. I need not 
say how much it has delighted me. Pray have the goodness to 
write and inform me how you and Mrs Sydney are, and where 
your new-married daughter is. Best regards to all you love. 
Ever yours, S. G. Lyndhurst. 

272.] To Lady Holland. 

Bristol, Feb. 17, 1828. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

An extremely comfortable prebendal house ; seven-stall stables 
and room for four carriages, so that I can hold all your cortege 
when you come ; looks to the south, and is perfectly snug and par- 
sonic ; masts of West-Indiamen seen from the windows. The col- 
leagues I have found here are a Mr Ridley, cousin to Sir Matthew ; 
a very good-natured, agreeable man,— deaf, tottering, worldly- 
minded, vain as a lawyer, noisy, and perfectly good-natured and 
obliging. The little Dean I have not seen ; he is as small as the 
Bishop, they say. It is supposed that the one of these ecclesiastics 
elevated upon the shoulders of the other, would fall short of the 
Archbishop of Canterbury's wig. The Archbishop of York is 
forced to go down on his knees to converse with the Bishop of 
Bristol, just as an elephant kneels to receive its rider. 

I have lived in perfect solitude ever since I have been here, but 
am perfectly happy. The novelty of this place amuses me. 

* Marriage of his youngest daughter to N. Hibbert, Esq. 



LETTERS OE THE REV. SI DNEY SMITH. 467 

It seems to me that Lord Wellington has made a great mistake 
in not putting a perfectly independent man, or an apparently inde- 
pendent man, over the army. The cry against a military governor 
will now be very loud. Your sincere and affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

273.] To Lord Holland. 

Fostou, July, 1828. 
My dear Lord Holland, 

I hear with great concern of your protracted illness. I would 
bear the pain for a fortnight for you if I were allowed to roar, for I 
cannot bear pain in silence and dignity. 

I have suffered no damage in corn nor hay. Several Dissenters 
have suffered in our neighbourhood. Pecchio's marriage goes on 
well. The lawyers are busy on the settlements. I cannot say how 
happy it makes me to see in port a man so clever, so honourable, 
and so unfortunate. I go to Bristol the middle of September, call- 
ing in my way on the two Lyttletons, Abercromby, Meynell, and 
(but do not tell Whishaw) Lord Bathurst. 

I am reading Walter Scott's " Napoleon/' which I do with the 
greatest pleasure. I am as much surprised at it, as at any of his 
works. So current, so sensible, animated, well-arranged : so agree- 
able to take up, so difficult to put down, and, for him, so candid ! 
There are of course many mistakes, but that has nothing to do 
with the general complexion of the work. 

I see the Duke of Bedford takes the chair for the Amelioration 
of the Jews. It would make me laugh to see that excellent Duke 
in the midst of the Ten Tribes, and I think he would laugh also. 
But what will become of our trade of contending against religious 
persecution ? Everybody will be emancipated before we die ! I say 
our trade, for I have learnt it from you, and been your humble imi- 
tator. 

God bless you, dear Lord Holland ! There is nobody in the 
world has a greater affection for you than I have, or who hears with 
greater pain of your illness and confinement. S. S. 



274.] To Henry Howard, Esq. 

Bristol, Aug. 28, 1828. 

My dear Sir, 

You will be amused by hearing that I am to preach the 5th of 

November sermon at Bristol, and to dine at the 5th of November 

dinner with the Mayor and Corporation of Bristol. All sorts of bad 

theology are preached at the Cathedral on that day, and all sorts of 



468 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

bad toasts drunk at the Mansion-House. I will do neither the one 
nor the other, nor bow the knee in the house of Rimmon. 

It would, I am sure, give Mrs Sydney and myself great pleasure 
to pay you a visit in Cumberland, and one day or another it shall 
be done ; but remember, the difference is, you pass near us in 
coming to London, and it must be by ?nalice prepense if we come 
to you. I hope you have seen the Carlisles, because I wish you all 
sorts of happiness, and know none greater than the society of such 
enlightened, amiable, and dignified people. When does Philip 
come to see me ? does he fear being converted to the Protestant 
faith ? Brougham thinks the Catholic question as good as carried ; 
but I never think myself as good as carried, till my horse brings me 
to my stable-door ! Still Dawson's conversion is portentous. Lady 

in former times insisted upon Lady Bessborough having a 

tooth out before she herself would venture : — probably Peel has 
made Dawson become a proselyte before him, in the same spirit. 
What am I to do with my time, or you with yours, after the Catholic 
question is carried ? 

Fine weather, — or, to speak more truly, dreadful heat ; — both 
hay and corn without a drop of rain ; while many Dissenters in the 
neighbourhood have lost their crops. I have read Knight's pamphlet : 
pretty good, though I think, if I had seen as much, I could have 
told my story better ; — but I am a conceited fellow. Still, what- 
ever are my faults, I am, dear Mr Howard, most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



275.] To Lord Holland. 

Bristol, Nov. 5, 1828. 
My dear Lord Holland, 

To-day I have preached an honest sermon (5th of November), 
before the Mayor and Corporation, in the Cathedral ; — the most 
Protestant Corporation in England ! They stared at me with all 
their eyes. Several of them could not keep the turtle on their 
stomachs. I know your taste for sermons is languid, but I must 
extract one passage for Lord Holland, to show that I am still as 
honest a man as when he first thought me a proper object for his 
patronage. 

" I hope, in the condemnation of the Catholic religion, in which 
I sincerely join their worst enemies, I shall not be so far mistaken 
as to have it supposed that I would convey the slightest approba- 
tion of any laws which disqualify and incapacitate any class of men 
for civil offices, on account of religious opinions. I consider all 
such laws as fatal and lamentable mistakes in legislation,; they are 
the mistakes of troubled times and half-barbarous ages. All 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 469 

Europe is gradually emerging from their influence. This country 
has lately made a noble and successful effort for their abolition. In 
proportion as this example is followed, I firmly believe the enemies 
of the Church and State will be lessened, and the foundation of 
peace, order, and happiness will receive additional strength. 

" I cannot discuss the uses and abuses of this clay ; but I should 
be beyond measure concerned if a condemnation of theological 
errors were construed into an approbation of laws so deeply marked 
by the spirit of intolerance." 

I have been reading the " Duke of Rovigo." A fool, a villain, 
and as dull as it is possible for any book to be about Buonaparte. 
Lord Bathurst's place is ugly ; his family and himself always agree- 
able. Believe me always very affectionately, Sydney Smith. 



276.] To John Murray, Esq. 

November 28, 1828. 
My dear' Murray, 

Noble weather ! I received some grouse in the summer, and 
upon the direction was marked W. M. This I construed to be 
William Murray, and wrote to thank him. This he must have 
taken as a foolish quiz, or as a petition for game. Pray explain and 
put this right. 

The Kent meeting has, I think, failed as an example. This, and 
the three foolish noblemen's letters, will do good. The failure of 
the Kent precedent I consider as of the utmost importance. The 
Duke keeps his secret. I certainly believe he meditates some im- 
provement. I rather like his foreign politics, in opposition to the 
belligerent Quixotism of Canning. He has the strongest disposi- 
tion to keep this country in profound peace, to let other nations 
scramble for freedom as they can, without making ourselves the 
liberty-mongers of all Europe ; a very seductive trade, but too 
ruinous and expensive. 

How is Jeffrey's throat ? — 

That throat, so vex'd by cackle and by cup, 
Where wine descends, and endless words come up. 
Much injured organ ! Constant is thy toil ; 
Spits turn to do thee harm, and coppers boil : 
Passion and punch, and toasted cheese and paste, 
And all that 's said and swallow'd lay thee waste ! 

I have given notice to my tenant here, and mean to pass the 
winters at Bristol. I hope, as soon as you can afford it, you will 
give up the law. Why bore yourself with any profession, if you are 
rich enough to do without it ? Ever yours, dear Murray, 

Sydney Smith. 



4/0 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

277.] To Lady Holland. 

December, 1828. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

Many thanks for your kind anxiety respecting my health. I not 
only was never better, but never half so well : indeed I find I have 
been very ill all my life, without knowing it. Let me state some of 
the goods arising from abstaining from all fermented liquors. 
First, sweet sleep ; having never known what sweet sleep was, 
I slept like a baby or a ploughboy. If I wake, no needless terrors, 
no black visions of life, but pleasing hopes and pleasing recollec- 
tions : Holland House, past and to come ! If I dream, it is not of 
lions and tigers, but of Easter dues and tithes. Secondly, I can 
take longer walks, and make greater exertions without fatigue. 
My understanding is improved, and I comprehend Political 
Economy. I see better without wine and spectacles than when 
I used both. Only one evil ensues from it : I am in such extra- 
vagant spirits that I must lose blood, or look out for some one who 
will bore and depress me. Pray leave off wine : — the stomach 
quite at rest ; no heartburn, no pain, no distension. 

Bobus is more like a wrestler in the Olympic games than a 

victim of gout. I am glad is become so bold. How often 

have I conjured him to study indiscretion, and to do the rashest 
things that he could possibly imagine ! With what sermons, and 
with what earnest regard, I have warned him against prudence and 
moderation ! I begin to think I have not laboured in vain. 

I disappear from the civilised world on Friday. S. S. 



278.] To Francis Jeffrey, Esq. 

No date: about 1828 or 1829. 
My dear Jeffrey, 

I trust you and I hang together by other ties than those ot 
Master Critic and Journeyman ditto. At the same time, since 
I left your employment, you have not written a syllable to me.* 
I hope you will do so, for among all your friends you have none 
who have a more sincere regard or a higher admiration for you ; 
and it would be wicked not to show these epistolary remembrances 
of each other. 

I should be glad to know your opinion of the Corn Bill. I am 
an advocate for the principle, but would restrict the protection 
price to nine shillings instead of ten. The latter price is a protec- 
tion to rents — not to agriculture. I confess I have not nerve 

* Mr Sydney Smith ceased to write in the Edinburgh Review when he became a dig- 
nitary of the Church, towards the end of the year 1827. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 471 

enough for the stupendous revolution that the plan of growing our 
bread in France would produce. I should think it rash ; and it 
certainly is unjust ; because we are compelled to grow our lace, 
silk-goods, scissors, and ten thousand other things in England, by 
prohibitory duties on the similar productions of other countries. 
These views are probably weak, and I hold them by a slender 
thread, only till taught better ; but I hold them.* 

There is a great peer in our neighbourhood, who gives me the 
run of his library while he is in town ; and I am fetching up my 
arrears in books, which everybody (who reads at all) has read ; 
among others, I stumbled upon the " Life of Kotzebue," or rather 
his year of exile, and read it with the greatest interest. It is a 
rapid succession of very striking events, told with great force and 
simplicity. His display of sentiment seems natural to the man, 
foolish as it sometimes is. With Madame de StaeTs Memoirs, so 
strongly praised by the excellent Baron Grimm, I was a good deal 
disappointed: she has nothing to tell, and does not tell it very well. 
She is neither important, nor admirable for talents or virtues. I 
see your name mentioned among the writers in " Constable's En- 
cyclopaedia ;" pray tell me what articles you have written: I shall 
always read anything which you write. Is the work carried on 
well ? The travels of the Gallo-American gentleman alluded to by 
Constable, are, I suppose, those of M. Simond. He is a very sen- 
sible man, and I should be curious to see the light in which this 
country appeared to him. I should think he would be too severe. 

We are all perfectly well. I am busy at my little farm and cot- 
tage, which you gave me reason to believe Mrs Jeffrey and yourself 
would visit. Pray remember me to Murray, and believe me ever, 
my dear Jeffrey, now, and years hence, when you are a judge, and 
the Review is gone to the dogs, your sincere and affectionate 
friend, ' Sydney Smith. 



279.] To Bedford, Esq. — (Bristol.) 

Foston, Jan. 13, 1829. 
Dear Sir, 
I always intended to explain to you why I declined to be Steward 
to the dinner given for the Charity of the -Sons of the Clergy, but it 
went out of my head while I was at Bristol. 

1 object to the whole plan of the thing. It appears to me quite 
ridiculous to desire two men to pay for a charity dinner, where 
actually, in many instances, less is collected during the dinner than 
the dinner costs. Men who mean to patronise a charity should 

* Mr Sydney Smith held them not long. He became an advocate, sjid a very earnest 
one, for Free Trade. — Note by Mrs Sydney Smith. 



472 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

dine at their own costs ; the use of Stewards would then be, to 
guarantee the innkeeper that he should not be a loser by providing 
dinner for a certain number of persons. 

If two gentlemen were to give such a guarantee to the extent of 
£15 or ^20 each, this would be a fair tax upon their time, trouble, 
and pocket ; but to ask any man to give a dinner for charitable 
purposes, where the guests coming for charitable purposes do not 
give the value of what they eat and drink, is an abuse which I never 
will countenance. It is in vain to say money is sent after dinner ; 
so it would be if all paid for their dinner. If ever this alteration be 
made, and I am wanted as Steward, I will serve, or be at the ex- 
pense of serving ; but not till I have seen the amended plan. 

I write this to you, not as Secretary to the Society, but as a 
neighbour and an acquaintance ; because, though I have a right 
to say to the Society, yes or no, I have no right to criticise their 
institutions, or to propose to them any change in their plans. My 
motive for taking the part I have done, is, not only that I have no 
money to fling away upon institutions so faulty in their construc- 
tion (however excellent their principle), but because I believe I am 
expressing the opinion of many persons who are too timid to ex- 
press it themselves, and who would feel the expense as a great 
and unprofitable burden. I remain, dear Sir, with sincere good 
wishes, yours, Sydney Smith. 

280.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, July 13, 1829. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I should be very glad to hear that Lord Howick is recovered, 
and that you passed through your London campaign, if not with 
glory, at least without defeat and doctor's bills. I am extremely 
pleased with Combe Florey,'and pronounce it to be a very pretty 
place in a very beautiful country. The house I shall make decently 
convenient. I have sixty acres of good land round it. The habit 
of the country is to give dinners and not to sleep out, so this I shall 
avoid. I am reading Hall's book, but will read it through before I 
say a word about it, for I find my opinion changes so much be- 
tween the first and third volume of a book. 

I was glad to see my Lord presiding at the democratical College : 
he would do it in the very best manner the thing could be done. 

My spirits are very much improved, but I have now and then 
sharp pangs of grief.* I did not know I had cared so much for 
anybody; but the habit of providing for human beings, and watch- 

* Mr Sydney Smith's eldest son, Douglas, died in the previous April, at the age of 
twenty-four. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 473 

ing over them for so many years, generates a fund of affection, of 
the magnitude of which I was not aware. 

Though living in a very improved climate, we have had fires in 
every room in the house. It is a bad and an unhappy year ! Ii 
grieves me to think, when you go to the North, that I shall be five 
hundred miles from Howick. It is now near thirty years since I 
made acquaintance, and then friends, with its inhabitants. You 
must all come and see this Valley of Flowers when you visit Lady 
Elizabeth in the West. It is a most parsonic parsonage, like those 
described in novels. 

I cannot congratulate you, dear Lady Grey, upon the marriage 
of your daughter. Happen it must ; but it is a dreadful calamity 
when it does happen. 

You must read Basil Hall's Travels, at all events ; that is inevit- 
able. It is not a book which will (to use Lord Dudley's phrase) 
blow over. 

God bless you, dear Lady Grey! Write me a line when you 
have any time to spare, to tell me of the welfare of all your family. 

Sydney Smith. 

281.] To the Countess of Morley. 

Combe Florey, Atcgust^ 1829. 

Health and respect, dear Lady Morley ! 

I am quite delighted with the West of England. 

God send peace to the Empire, and particularly to the Church ; 
and may mankind continue quietly to set forth a tenth of the earth's 
produce for the support of the clergy ; inasmuch as it is known to 
draw a blessing on the other nine parts, and is wonderfully com- 
fortable to all ranks and descriptions of persons. 

Sydney Smith. 



282.] To the Countess of Morley. 

Combe F/o?-ey, 1829. 
Dear Lady Morley, 

I am sincerely sorry to hear of the protracted sufferings of Lord 
Morley ; at the same time, my opinion always was, that the gout, 
entering upon a peer of the realm, had too good a thing of it to be 
easily dispossessed. 

I am going on fighting with bricklayers and carpenters, and shall 
ultimately make a very pretty place, and a very good house. 
Nothing so vile as the artificers of this country ! A straight line 
in Somersetshire is that which includes the greatest possible tlis- 



4/4 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

tance between the extreme points. I should have had great pleasure 
in paying you a visit, but the Fates will have things their own way. 
I remain yours, Sydney Smith. 

283.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 6, 1829. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

The harvest here is got in without any rain. I mean, the wheat 
harvest. The cider is such an enormous crop, that it is sold at ten 
shillings per hogshead ; so that a human creature may lose his 
reason for a penny. 

I continue to be delighted with the country. My parsonage will 
be perfection. The only visitor I have had here is Mr Jeffrey, who, 
I believe (though he richly deserves that good fortune), is scarcely 
known to Lord Grey and yourself. A man of rare talent and un- 
bending integrity, who has been honest even in Scotland ; which is 
as if he were temperate and active at Capua. 

Talking of honest men, I beg to be remembered to Lord Howick, 
on whom I lay great stress ; from his understanding, rank, and 
courage, he will be an important parsonage in the days to come. 
Pat him on the back, and tell him that the safety and welfare of a 
country depend in a great measure on men like himself. Pray tell 
us of some good books to send for from the Subscription Library. 
I would tell you, if I had looked at any other book than the 
" Builders' Price Book." They are opposing poor Sir Thomas 
Lethbridge for the county of Somerset. I mean to vote and do 
everything I can for him : it is right to encourage converts'. 

Eternal rain here. Mr Jeffrey wanted to persuade me that 
myrtles grew out-of-doors in Scotland, as here. Upon cross- 
examination, it turned out they were prickly, and that many had 
been destroyed by the family donkey. Sydney Smith. 



284.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 29, 1829. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

After thirty years of kindness, it was not necessary to apologise 
for not replying to my light and nonsensical effusions, which really 
required ro answer. 

I am going to Lord Morley's, where I was first bound to meet 
the Chancellor and Lady Lyndhurst. Nothing can be more insane 
than to make such engagements in my present state. I consider 
that every day's absence from home costs me £10 in the villany of 
carpenters and bricklayers : for as I am my own architect and 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 475 

clerk of the works, you may easily imagine what is done when I 
am absent. I continue to be delighted with my house and place. 

The Duke of Wellington has given, I think, the first signs I ever 
remarked of weakness, in prosecuting for libels ; not for libels 
which regard a particular fact, as that for which the Chancellor 
has prosecuted, but for general abuse. I am sorry for the King, 
and for all his subjects upon whom the evils of age are falling. 

I told if he would have patience he would have a little girl 

at last. I might have said, he might have twenty little girls. 
What is there to prevent him from having a family sufficient to 
exasperate the placid Malthus ? I met your neighbours, Mr and 
Mrs Calcott, at Bowood. Reasonable, enlightened people. I was 
also much pleased with Lady Louisa, Lord Lansdowne's daughter ; 
very clever and very amiable. Luttrell came over for a day, from 
whence I know not, but I thought not from good pastures ; at 
least, he had not his usual soup-and-pattie look. There was a 
forced smile upon his countenance, which seemed to indicate plain 
roast and boiled, and a sort of apple-pudding depression, as if he 
had been staying with a clergyman. God bless you, dear Lady 
Holland ! Kindest regards to all. Sydney Smith. 



285.] To Jonathan Gray, Esq.— (York). 

Combe Florey, Taunton, Oct, 10, 1829. 
My dear Sir, 

Nobody can more sincerely wish the prosperity of the road from 
York to Oswaldkirk than I do. I wish to you hard materials, 
diligent trustees, gentle convexity, fruitful tolls, cleanly gutters, 
obedient parishes, favouring justices, and every combination of 
fortunate circumstances which can fall to the lot of any human 
highway. These are my wishes, but I can only wish. I cannot, 
from the bottom of Somersetshire, attend in person, as a letter 
(2s. 6d. postage) yesterday invited me to do. Perhaps you will 
have the goodness to scratch my name out of the list of trustees. 

You will be glad to hear that I am extremely pleased with this 
place. Friendships and acquaintances are not speedily replaced ; 
but as far as outward circumstances, I am quite satisfied. If ever 
you come into this country I shall be very glad to see you ; and I 
remain, dear sir, with sincere respect and goodwill, yours truly, 

Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — I shall think on the 15 th of my friends at the White Bear, 
Stillington. How honourable to English gentlemen, that, once or 
twice every month, halt the men of fortune in England are jammed 



476 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

together at the White Bear, crushed into a mass at the Three 
Pigeons, or perspiring intensely at the Green Dragon ! 



2S6.] To N. Fazakerly, Esq. 

Combe Floiry, October, 1829. 
Dear Fazakerly, 

I don't know anybody who would be less affronted at being 
called hare-brained than our friend who has so tardily conveyed 
my message, and I am afraid now he has only given you a part of 
it. The omission appears to be, that I had set up an hotel on the 
Western road,* that it would be open next spring, and I hoped for 
the favour of yours and Mrs Fazakerly's patronage. " Well-aired 
beds, neat wines, careful drivers, &c, &c." 

I shall have very great pleasure in coming to see you, and I quite 
agree in the wisdom of postponing that event till the rural Palladios 
and Vitruvii are chased away ; I have fourteen of them here every 
day. The country is perfectly beautiful, and my parsonage the 
prettiest place in it. 

I was at Bowood last week : the only persons there were sea- 
shore Calcott and his wife, — two very sensible, agreeable people. 
Luttrell came over for the day ; he was very agreeable, but spoke 
too lightly, I thought, of veal soup. I took him aside, and reasoned 
the matter with him, but in vain ; to speak the truth, Luttrell is 
not steady in his judgments on dishes. Individual failures witl^ 
him soon degenerate into generic objections, till, by some fortunate 
accident, he eats himself into better opinions. A person of more 
calm reflection thinks not only of what he is consuming at that 
moment, but of the soups of the same kind he has met with in a 
long course of dining, and which have gradually and justly elevated 
the species. I am perhaps making too much of this ; but the 
failures of a man of sense are always painful. 

I quite agree about Napier's book. I did not think that any man 
would venture to write so true, bold, and honest a book ; it gave me 
a high idea of his understanding, and makes me very anxious about 
his caractere. Ever yours, Sydney Smith. 



287.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Combe Florey, Dec. 14, 1829. 
Dear John Murray, 
My house is assuming the forms of maturity, and a very capital 
house it will be for a parsonage,— far better than that at Foston. 

* Mr Smith had just settled at Combs Florey. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 477 

Your threats of coming to sec us give us great pleasure. When 
will you come ? Let it be for a good long stay. Pray remember 
me kindly to Mrs Murray, and tell her that the only fault I find 
in her is an excessive attachment to bishops and tithes ; an amiable 
passion, but which may be pushed too far. 

I cannot say the pleasure it gives me that my old and dear 
friend Jeffrey is in the road to preferment. I shall not be easy 
till he is fairly on the Bench. His robes, God knows, will cost 
him little ; one buck rabbit will clothe him to the heels. 

I have been paying some aristocratic visits to Lord Bath and 
Lord Bathurst. Lady Bath is a very agreeable, conversable 
woman. Lord and Lady Bathurst, and Lady Georgiana, are 
charming. Nothing can exceed the beauty of this country, — forty 
and fifty miles together of fertility and interesting scenery. I 
hardly think I have any news to tell you. The Duke of Bedford 
has given in his adhesion to the Duke of Wellington, as have 
all the Tories, except four. Read " Les Memoires d'une Femme 
de Quality sur Louis XVIII." It is by Madame du Cayla, and 
extremely interesting. 

I was not at all pleased with the article in the Edinburgh 
Review on the Westminster Review, and thought the Scotchman 
had the worst of it. How foolish and profligate, to show that 
the principle of general utility has no foundation, that it is often 
opposed to the interests of the individual ! If this be not true, 
there is an end of all reasoning and all morals : and if any man 
asks, why am I to do what is generally useful ? he should not be 
reasoned with, but called rogue, rascal, &c, and the mob should 
be excited to break his windows. 

God bless you, dear Murrray ! SYDNEY Smith. 



288.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey, 1829. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

I should be glad to hear from you, and the more so, as I have 
heard lately that your little boy was not stout. This place is very 
beautiful, and in a most beautiful country. I need not say how my 
climate is improved. The neighbourhood much the same as all 
other neighbourhoods. Red wine and white, soup and fish, bad wit 
and good nature. I am, after my manner, making my place perfect ; 
and have twenty-eight people constantly at work. 

I am often very unhappy at my loss. It is the first real misfortune 
which ever befell me. 

Tell me some good books. Read Bourrienne's "Memoirs ;• they 
are very curious and entertaining. I think I have made a very 



47 S LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

wise move in coming here, and am perfectly satisfied with myself 
I wish you were as much satisfied with me. 

Sydney Smith. 



289.] To Sir George Philips. 

No date : about the end of 1829. 
My dear Philips, 

I shall follow Vance's plan, and am much obliged to you for 
reminding me of it. My attack was slight, but well for a begin- 
ing ; it was of the gout family, but hardly gout itself. I will come 
and see you, for old friendship's sake; but all countries will appear 
mean after this, and all houses comfortless after my parsonage, to 
which Foston House is as Sternhold and Hopkins to Lord Byron. 

Read " Laurie Todd," by Gait. It is excellent ; no surprising 
events, or very striking characters, but the humorous and enter- 
taining parts of common life, brought forward in a tenour of 
probable circumstances. Read Rafrles's Life. A virtuous, active, 
high-minded man ; placed at last where he ought to be : a round 
man, in a round hole. 

I am going on most prosperously with my buildings. I hope to 
be in town by the beginning of May. Your great Duke seems, like 
my ankle, to be getting stronger every day. He is an excellent 
Minister, and bids fair to be as useful in peace as in war, and to show 
the utility of beating swords into pruning-hooks. 

And now, Sir George, let me caution you against indulgence in 
that enormous appetite of yours. You eat every day as much as 
four men in holy orders, — yourself a layman ! Ever, my dear 
Philips, yours most sincerely, Sydney Smith. 



290.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey, April 17, 1830. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

I have (as you say) had the gout, not severely, but it was a 
monition. How I came not to have had it years ago I cannot tell. 
My place is delightful ; never was there a more delightful parson- 
age ! Come and see it. Be ill, and require mild air and an affec- 
tionate friend, and set off for Combe Florey. 

Have you read Moore ? I come in, I see, for a little notice once 
or twice. I find the Peer and Poet (and I knew it only yesterday) 
has dedicated a stanza or two to me in "Don Juan." 

God bless you, dear Gena ! Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 479 

291. j To H. Howard, Esq.* 

Combe Florey, Taunton, A ug. 2, 1 830. 
My dear Sir, 
The intelligence we have received to-day, from the kind trans- 
mission of the Carlisle paper, gave us all here sincere pleasure. It 
is a pure pleasure to me to see honourable men of ancient famil> 
restored to their birthright. I rejoice in the temple which has been 
reared to Toleration ; and I am proud that I worked as a brick- 
layer's labourer at it — without pay, and with the enmity and abuse 
of those who were unfavourable to its construction. We are finish- 
ing here, and are in a very beautiful parsonage ; come and see me. 
You owe me some recompense for my zeal. Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

292.] To the Honourable Miss Fox. 

August, 1830. 
My dear Miss Fox, 

Merely to say that these and twenty such handbills t were not, 
as you suppose, written by me, but by a neighbouring curate. 
They have had an excellent effect. There is one from Miss Swing, 
threatening to destroy crimping-irons for caps, and washing- 
machines, and patent tea-kettles ; vowing vengeance also on the 
new bodkin which makes two holes instead of one. 

Justices' wives are agitated, and female constables have been 
sworn in. Ever yours, Sydney Smith. 

293.] To the Countess Grey. 

1830. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I am not without apprehensions for the new French Revolution ; 
but I admire and rejoice. However it may end, it was nobly 
begun. I do not know what to do with the captive Ministers, but 
I am afraid I must hang them. 

I knew Huskisson very well, and sincerely lament his loss. He 
was to me a very agreeable man ; for he was always ready to talk 
on his own subjects, and was always clear, instructive, and good- 
natured. The Duke has got rid of his only formidable antagonist 
in the House of Commons, and it seems to me clear that the rem- 
nant of that party will now enlist under his standard ; and I dare 
say they have by this time taken the marching shilling. 

I was not disappointed by Plymouth. The papers were delighted 
with my urbanity and good-humour, and by the appearance of ex- 

* On the election of his son as M.P. for Carlisle. 
t Letters to Swing. 



480 LE TIERS OF THE RE J \ S 1 'DNE Y SMITH. 

ccllent health which I exhibited. They described my visit to the 
dockyard and the Caledonia, and the deep knowledge of my pro- 
fession which I displayed. If the real Sir Sydney goes there, he 
will infallibly be taken for an impostor. 

I have great pleasure in hearing from you. We are now old 
friends, and have run the better half of the race of life : you, on 
high ground ; I, on low ground. Of the little that remains, I 
endeavour to make the best. I am a little surprised that I have 
scrambled through it so well as I have. That I have lived on good 
terms with so many good people, gives me more pleasure than any 
other reflection. I must beg of the noble Earl and you to continue 
to me as long as you can that source of pleasure. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 

294.] To Lady Holland. 

Weston House, Oct. 15, 1830. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

We are here on a visit to Sir George Philips, who has built a 
very magnificent house in the Holland House style, but of stone : 
a pretty place in a very ugly country. 

I am very glad to see Charles in the Guards.. He will now re- 
main at home ; for I trust that there will be no more embarkation 
of the Guards while I live, and that a captain of the Guards will 
be as ignorant of the colour of blood as the rector of a parish. We 
have had important events enough within the last twenty years. 
May all remaining events be culinary, amorous, literary, or any- 
thing but political ! 

Lord John Russell comes here to-day. His corporeal antipart, 

Lord N , is here. Heaven send he may not swallow John ! 

There are, however, stomach-pumps, in case of accident. Bobus 
talks of coming to us in November. When I see him I will believe 
in him. We shall return home the beginning of November, stay 
till the end of the year, and then go to Bristol; that is, if the 
Church of England lasts so long ; but there is a strong impression 
that there will be a rising of curates. Should anything of this kind 
occur, they will be committed to hard preaching on the tread-pulpit 
(a new machine) ; and rendered incapable of ever hereafter collect- 
ing great or small tithes. I remain always your affectionate and 
obliged friend, Sydney Smith. 

295.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Weston House, Oct 24, 1830. 
My dear Murray, 
There will be no changes in the Government before Christmas ; 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 481 

and by that time the Duke will probably have gained some re- 
cruits. He does not want numbers, but defenders. Whoever 
goes into his cabinet, goes there as an inferior, to register the 
Duke's resolutions, — not as an equal, to assist in their formation ; 
and this is a situation into whieh men of spirit and character do 
not choose to descend. The death of Huskisson has strengthened 
him very materially ; his firmness, powers of labour, sagacity, and 
good-nature, and his vast military reputation, will secure his power. 
Averse from liberal measures, he will be as liberal as the times 
require ; and will listen to instructed men on subjects where he has 
no opinions, or wrong ones. 

During the first moments of the French Revolution, La Fayette 
had almost resolved upon a republic, but was turned the other 
way by the remonstrances and representations of the American 
Minister. 

The new Beer Bill has begun its operations. Everybody is 
drunk. Those who are not singing are sprawling. The sovereign 
people are in a beastly state. 

You are rich and rambling ; pray come and see us next year. 
Your very sincere and affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 



296.] To John Allen, Esq. 

November, 1830. 
Dear Allen, 

Pray tell me how Lord Holland is, as I do not at all like the 
accounts I have received from Lord John. 

I am frightened at the state of the world ; I shall either be 
burnt, or lose my tithes, or be forced to fight, or some harm will 
happen to disturb the drowsy slumbers of my useless old age. 

talks of coming to see me; but I have not the slightest 

belief. He will break down on the road, and return, or be lost in 
the Capua of Bowood, or be alarmed by Surrey incendiaries, and 
sit up all night surrounded by pails of water, squirts, and syringes. 
I have been visited by an old enemy, the lumbago ; equally 
severe, as it seems, upon priests and anti-priests. I believe it 
comes from the stomach ; at least it is to that organ that all 
medical men direct their curative intentions. 

Tell me what is going to happen. Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

297.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Nov. 21, 1830. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I never felt a more sincere pleasure than from Lord Grey's 

2 H 



482 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

appointment. After such long toil, such labour, privation, and 
misrepresentation, that a man should be placed where Providence 
intended he should be, — that honesty and virtue should, at last, 
meet with their reward, — is a pleasure which rarely occurs in 
human life ; and one which, I confess, I had not promised myself. 

I am particularly glad that Brougham (if my friend Lord Lynd- 
hurst must go out) is Chancellor, — for many reasons. I should 
have preferred Goderich for Home, Melbourne for Colonial Secre- 
tary. The Duke of Richmond is well imagined. I am very glad 
Lord Durham is in the Cabinet, because I like him, and for better 
reasons. Sir James Graham surprises me. The appointment is 
excellent ; but I should have thought there must have been so 
many great people who would have been clamorous. Pray give 
John Russel an office, and Macaulay is well worth your atttention; 
make him Solicitor-General. 

Adieu, my dear Lady Grey ! Give my sincere and affectionate 
regards to Lord Grey. Thank God he has at last disappeared from 
that North Wall, against which so many sunless years of his life 
have been passed ! Your sincere and affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

298.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey, November, 1830. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

What do you think of all these burnings ? and have you heard of 
the new sort of burnings ? Ladies' maids have taken to set their 
mistresses on fire. Two dowagers were burnt last week, and large 
rewards are offered! They are inventing little fire-engines for the 
toilet-table, worked with lavender water ! 

This place is perfection ; I never saw a more charming parson- 
age or a more beautiful country. I go to Bristol for a residence of 
six weeks at the end of the year, or sooner, if my house is set on 
fire. 

Never was any administration so completely and so suddenly 
destroyed ; and, I believe, entirely by the Duke's declaration ; 
made, I suspect, in perfect ignorance of the state of public feeling 
and opinion. Adieu ! Ever yours affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 

299.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe Florey, Dec 20, 183a 
My dear Philips, 
I was in hopes to have spent a quiet old age ; but all Europe is 
getting into a blaze, and that light-headed old fool, La Fayette, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 483 

wants, I see, to crusade it for Poland. Swing is retiring. He is 
only formidable when he takes you unawares. He was stopped in 
his way from Kent before he reached us. I can give you no plan 
for employing the poor. I took great pains about these matters 
when I was a magistrate, but have forgotten all my plans. There 
are too many human beings on the earth ; every two men ought to 
kill a third. 

I should not be suprised if there were a dissolution of Parlia- 
ment. I think the Tories will try to make a last rally with this 
Parliament, yet the fools ought to see that there is nothing between 
Lord Grey and Cobbett. 

spent a fortnight with us ; he was remarkably well and 

contradictory — clear of gout and of assent. 

Read the " Collegians," an admirable novel, but an old one, of 
two or three years' standing. Sydney Smith. 



300.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Clifton, January 3, 1831. 
My dear Murray, 

I have not heard the particulars of Jeffrey becoming Lord 
Advocate, but I know enough to know they redound to your 
honour. Your conspiracy at Brougham Hall must have been 
very interesting. Principally Edinburgh Reviewers ! How very 
singular ! The Review began in high places (garrets), and ends 
in them. 

There is an end of insurrection ; I had made up my mind to 
make an heroic stand, till the danger became real and proximate, 
and then I should have been discreet and capitulating. 

I can hardly picture to myself the rage and consternation of the 
Scotch Tories at this change, and at the liberality which is burst- 
ing out in every part of Scotland, where no lava and volcanic matter 
were suspected. I love liberty, but hope it can be so managed that 
I shall have soft beds, good dinners, fine linen, &c, for the rest of 
my life. I am too old to fight or to suffer. God bless you ! Love 
to Mrs Murray. Ever yours, Sydney Smith. 



301.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Bristol, Jan. 3, 1831. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 
Brougham has kindly offered me an exchange of livings, which 
I declined with many thanks. I think the Administration will last 
some time, because I think the country decided upon Reform ; and 



484 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

if the Tories will not permit Lord Grey to carry it into effect, they 
must turn it over to Hunt and Cobbett. 

I think the French Government far from stable, — like Meynell's 
horses at the end of a long day's chase. The government of the 
country is in the hands of armed shopkeepers ; and when the man 
with the bayonet deliberates, his reasons are more powerful than 
civilians can cope with. I am tired of liberty and revolution ! 
Where is it to end ? Are all political agglutinations to be unglued ? 
Are we prepared for a second Heptarchy, and to see the King of 
Sussex fighting with the Emperor of Essex, or marrying the 
Dowager Queen of Hampshire ? 

It would be amusing enough if the chances of preferment were, 
after all, to make me your neighbour. Many is the quarrel and 
making up we should have together. Thank you, my dear friend, 
for saying that proximity to me would make your life happier ! 
The rose that spreads its fragrance over the garden might as well 
thank the earth beneath for bearing it. 

You see Jeffrey has been nearly killed at his election. How 
funny to see all the Edinburgh Reviewers in office ! God bless 
you, my dear friend ! Sydney Smith. 



302.] To Colonel Fox. 

Combe F/orey, Feb. 19, 1831. 
My dear Charles, 

There is an excellent man here, Major C , late of the 32d, 

who instructed you, I believe, in the rudiments of your homicide 
profession. He is now on half-pay, has been in the service thirty 
years, and was in all the innumerable battles of the Duke of 
Wellington, ending in Waterloo, where he was wounded. Every 
man wishes to be something which he is not ; and upon this general 

plan of human nature, poor Major C is expiring to be a colonel 

by brevet, I believe it is called ; it carries with it no increase of 
pay, and is a mere appellation. Is this easy to be effected. If not 
over-difficult, lend the Major a helping hand ; he is really a man 
of great merit, but has no friends to help him. He has many minds 
to write to you, but is modest, and will never do it ; moreover, Irish 
Majors are not clever at inditing letters. I write wholly without 

his knowledge. He and Mrs have been remarkably civil to 

us, and I have taken a liking to him. 

We are settled, as you may possibly have heard, in a most beauti- 
ful part of Somersetshire, where we expect Mrs Fox and you the 
first time you are within ten miles of us ; for I have not the vanity 
to suppose that we could act upon you at a greater distance. I am 
truly sorry to hear that the most amiable aad m05t a ^- e °f ^ 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 485 

Dakes of Lancaster is so ill with the gout : I thank God I have 
hitherto kept off that toe-consuming tyrant. I think Lord Grey 
seems to be emerging from the dark fog in which he began his 
career. If your father turns him off, he must give Cobbett the 
Garter instead of the cord. I see nobody between Lord Grey and 
revolution. 

Pray remember me most kindly to dear Mrs Fox, and if she has 
forgotten me, help her to some primary tokens ; — grace and slender- 
ness, gravity and taciturnity, and other remarks which you can hit 
off with a bold pencil. I am panting to know a little what passes 
in the world. I meant to have been in London ere now, but have 
been prevented ; above all 1 want to see Brougham on his sack of 
wool. I see (meaning to say only a few words about poor Major 

) I have written a long letter ; but if you have not time to read 

it, make Mrs Fox read it, and tell you the contents. 

Sydney Smith. 

303.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey, Feb. 25, 1831. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 
Our friends, I am afraid, have lost ground by their Budget, and 
there is no dissembling that they are weak ; however, I hardly think 
the Tories would be bold enough to wish to succeed them just now. 
Another week will decide the fate of parties, perhaps of the kingdom. 
I have a very bad opinion of public affairs ; I never thought so ill 
of the world. Arbitrary governments are giving way everywhere, 
and will doom us to half a century of revolutions and expensive 
wars. It must be waded through, but I wish it had all been done 
before I was born. Wild beasts must be killed in the progress of 
civilisation, but thank God that my ancestors,— that is, not mine, 
for I have none, but Mr Meynell's ancestors, — did this some cen- 
turies ago. Write to me, and God bless you ! Sydney Smith. 



304.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Feb. 27, 183/. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I cannot help thinking of your new state. When I am very 
nervous I always do sums in arithmetic, and take camphor-julep 
Don't be afraid, — I am sure, from several signs, it will do ; and 
don't pretend to say you don't care, the truth being that you do 
care, from the very bottom of your heart. I meant to come to 
town, to afford you my spiritual consolation during the crisis, but 
I had an alarum about my daughter ; she had a very severe attack, 



486 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

and her recovery for some time was so slow, that I was frightened; 
she is now recovered. I hope to see you in the spring, where you 
are. If Lord Bathurst is there, I shall break the windows. 

Brougham's speech will make a great impression, and be very 
useful to the Administration. The world seems to be improving 
decidedly ; I thought it would have come to an end before now. 
I have been exhorting my little friend Jeffrey to make a great 
speech on Reform. Pray perceive his worth and great talents. 

Give my kind regards to my Lord. Your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

305.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, 1831. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

The person in question, — or rather, the parson in question, — 

Mr , is respectable, of small preferment, large family, good 

private fortune, moderate understanding, great expectations from 
relations ; a sincere friend to the emancipation of the Catholics, 
when there was danger and merit in publishing such opinions. 

Once for all, I take it for granted that neither Lord Grey nor 
you think me such an absurd coxcomb as to imagine that, with 
inferior information, experience, and talents, I can offer any advice 
to Lord Grey ; the truth is, that I attach such very little importance 
to my own opinions, that I have never the slightest objection to 
give them. And so, without any more preamble, or any repetition 
of preamble, I will tell you from time to time what occurs to me. 
I take it for granted you are prepared to make peers, to force the 
measure if it fail again, and I would have this intention half- 
officially communicated in all the great towns before the Bill was 
brought in. If this is not done — I mean, if peers are not made — 
there will be a general convulsion, ending in a complete revolution. 
Do not be too dignified, but yield to the necessity of demi-official 
communications. If the Huskisson party in the Cabinet are refrac- 
tory about making peers (should such a creation be necessary) 
turn out the Huskisson party. Their power is gone ; they are 
entirely at your mercy. God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! Ever 
yours, Sydney Smith. 

306.] To the Countess Grey. 

March 5, 1831. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I am just returned from my living in Devonshire, where I was 
called by a sort of rebellion of my curate. I find here your letter, 
for which many and best thanks. 

1 am now quite at my ease about Lord Grey and yourself. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 487 

Whether Lord Grey will go out or not, I cannot conjecture, as I 
know so little of the way Parliament is leaning ; but if he is driven 
out, it will be with an immense increase of reputation, with the 
gratitude and best wishes of the country, and with the sincere joy 
of his friends that he has ventured upon office, because they must 
know that he will be a happier man for all that has taken place. 
The plan is as wise as it is bold. I call it a magnificent measure, 
and am heartily glad it is understood to be his individually. God 
bless you, dear Lady Grey ! S. S. 



307.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe Florey, March 18, 1831. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

Of course it is impossible to reflect upon such extensive changes 
without being a little nervous ; but, taking the state of public opinion 
into the question, I think it a wise and proper measure. Yesterday 
I delivered a glowing harangue at Taunton, in favour of it ; justice 
compels me to say that there were only five coats in the room ; the 
rest were jackets and smock-frocks. They were delighted with me, 
and said they should like to bring me in as a member. 

Never write me any apologies, dear Lady Holland. You are 
always sure of me. Sometimes I hear and see less of yourself and 
Lord Holland, but I am irrevocably attached to you both. It would 
be odd, after thirty years of kindness and friendship from you and 
yours, if I were to alter for the little bit of life which remains to me. 
It will seem very odd to me to pass through Downing Street, and 
to see all my old friends turned into official dignitaries. 

I think the Jews should be kept for the private tyranny and in- 
tolerance of the Bishops. Thirty thousand Jews ! — it is but a small 
matter ! Do not be too hard upon the Church ! 

Sydney Smith. 

308.] To the Countess Grey. 

Sidmouth, April 25, 1831. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Bold King ! bold Ministers ! The immediate effect of the mea- 
sure is, that I had no sleep all last night. A meeting of freeholders 
at the inn at Sidmouth ; much speaking, and frequent sound of 
Lord Grey's name through the wall. I had a great mind, being a 
Devonshire freeholder, to appear suddenly in night-cap and dress- 
ing-gown, and to make a speech. 

I have left off writing myself, but I have persuaded a friend of 
mine, a Mr Dyson, to publish his speech to the freeholders, which I 



4S8 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

believe will be in your hands by Wednesday or Thursday, from Ridgw 
way. You may suppose it to be mine, but it is not ; and I ask it as a 
particular favour from Lord Grey and you, that you will not mention 
you have received it from me, or that I had any influence in produc- 
ing it. It is a mite added to the public stock of liberal principles, 
and not worth caution or trouble ; but my plan has always been to 
contribute my mite, and in my own particular way. My sincere 
hope is, that all this political agitation may not worry you, nor 
injure the health of Lord Grey. Sydney Smith. 



309.] To John Murray, Esq. 

8 Gloucester Place, Clifton, May, 1831. 
My dear Murray, 

Pray tell me how you are all going on in Scotland. Is Jeffrey 
much damaged ? They say he fought like a lion, and would have 
been killed had he been more visible ; but that several people 
struck at him who could see nothing, and so battered infinite space 
instead of the Advocate. 

I think Lord Grey will give me some preferment if he stays in 
long enough ; but the upper parsons live vindictively, nnd evince 
their aversion to a Whig Ministry by an improved health. The 

Bishop of has the rancour to recover after three paralytic 

strokes, and the Dean of to be vigorous at eighty-two. And 

yet these are men who are called Christians ! 

Do these political changes make any difference in your business? 
You are so rich that it is of no consequence ; but still it is pleasant 
to progress. Give my kind regards to your excellent wife, and to 
Mrs Jeffrey, a great favourite of mine. Sydney Smith. 



310.] To Lady Holland. 

May, 1831. 

I met John Russel at Exeter. The people along the road were 
very much disappointed by his smallness. I told them he was 
much larger before the Bill was thrown out, but was reduced by 
excessive anxiety about the people. This brought tears into their 
eyes ! S. S. 

311.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe Florey, July, 1 03 1. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
The weather here appears to have resembled the weather of the 
metropolis. At present it is oppressively hot. All my family are 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 489 

here ; I feel patriarchal. Cholera has not yet come amongst us, 
but it is at either end of our line, — at Exeter and Plymouth, and at 
Bristol. Seeing but little company, and not hearing every day how 
Thompson, and Simpson, and Jackson were attacked, I think less 
about it. 

Philosopher Malthus came here last week. I got an agreeable 
party for him of unmarried people. There was only one lady who 
had had a child ; but he is a good-natured man, and, if there are 
no appearances of approaching fertility, is civil to every lady. 
Malthus is a real moral philosopher, and I would almost consent to 
speak as inarticulately, if I could think and act as wisely. 

Read Cicero's " Letters to Atticus," translated by the Abbe* 
Mongon, with excellent notes. I sit in my beautiful study, looking 
upon a thousand flowers, and read agreeable books, in order to 
keep up arguments with Lord Holland and Allen. I thank God 
heartily for my comfortable situation in my old age, — above my 
deserts, and beyond my former hopes. Sydney Smith. 



312.] To the Countess Grey. 

August 18, 1 83 1. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I am truly glad to hear such an account of Lord Grey. Pray 
keep us at peace if it be possible, and deal only in glowing expostu- 
lations, not in blows. There is no wish for war in the country, 
quite the contrary. It is a mere cry to defeat the Bill ; — but I am 
sure nobody wishes for peace more than Lord Grey. 

I am staying at Lord 's, where is that honest politician 

. I must confess that the rogue is a sensible, agreeable man, 

but it vexes me to see such base profligacy so rewarded. 

Sydney Smith. 

313.] Protest. 

Extract from the " Times? 

The following Protest has been entered {we hear) upon the 
journals of the House of Lords by the new Bishop of Worcester. 

Dissentient, — Because the Address says that we have been 
dragged into the war, whereas we are deliberately walking into it. 

2d, Because scenes of horror, injustice, and oppression are 
never wanting upon the face of the earth ; and war, arising from 
the generous spirit of repressing such evils, would be interminable. 

3d, Because we are ruined. 

4th, Because no evil to arise from the ascendancy of France 
over Spain would be equal to the evil of going to war to prevent it, 



49o LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

5th, Because it is very probable that the Bourbons may be 
destroyed in the contest they have brought on themselves, without 
the necessity of our going to war at all to effect so desirable an 
object. 

6th, Because a system of absolute neutrality, so essential at this 
moment to the welfare of Great Britain, is, from our insular 
situation, at all times a much safer policy here than it would be for 
any continental nation. 

7th, Because such is the wicked and profligate extravagance 
with which all British wars are conducted, and so ineffectual the 
control exercised by a corrupt House of Commons over our 
national expenses, that nothing but the dread of invasion or the 
preservation of faith should induce this country to give up the 
advantages of peace. SYDNEY VIGOUR. 



315.] To the Countess Grey. 

1 83 1. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Many thanks for keeping us at peace. Life would not be worth 
having if there was a war. 

I hope you have all escaped from influenza better than we have, 
for Mrs Sydney has been seriously ill, and has escaped upon hard 
terms. 

I am going a tour for a week to Dunster Castle — Lord Fortescue's 
— and to Clovelly, a beautiful tract of country; and then I am 
going to Sidmouth, where I have taken a large house as close to 
the sea as your ball-room is to your drawing-room. I invite you 
and Lord Grey to come and see me ; and there is a large Russian 
Princess who would be glad to make your acquaintance. 

The passing the Bill in such weather, and against such opposition, 
will be honourably remembered, and is all virtue and courage. 
Lord Grey's path of honourable distinction is straight and clear, 
and nothing can now prevent him from getting to the end of it. 
You may depend upon it, that any attempt of the Lords to throw it 
out will be the signal for the most energetic resistance from one end 
of the kingdom to the other. 

The harvest here is enormous, such as was never known in the 
memory of man ; the weather celestial, and the sickness universal. 
The stoutest labourers as soon incapable of the smallest exertion. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 49* 

315.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Saville Row, September, 1831. 
My dear G., 
I am just stepping into the carriage to be installed* by the 
Bishop, but I cannot lose a post in thanking you. It is, I believe, 
a very good thing, and puts me at my ease for life. I asked for 
nothing — never did anything shabby to procure preferment. These 
are pleasing recollections. My pleasure is greatly increased by the 
congratulations of good and excellent friends like yourself. God 
bless you ! Sydney Smith. 

316.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Oct. 6, 1831. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I am very anxious about Lord Grey, and it will be a favour — a 
real favour — if you will write me a line, — literally a line. I don't 
want to know whether he is in or out, but whether he is satisfied 
with himself, and well. His speech was admirable ; and so, as I 
learn from my letters, it was considered on the spot. 

I send my speech, which missed you the last time I sent it. It 
is of little value, but honest. I found public meetings everywhere, 
and the utmost alarm at the idea of the Bill being thrown out ; 
coachmen, ostlers, inside and outside passengers, barmaids, and 
waiters, all eager for news. From your grateful and affectionate 
friend, Sydney Smith. 

317.] To Lady Elizabeth Bulteel. 

Combe Florey, 1831. 
My dear Lady Elizabeth, 

I cannot say how much obliged we are by your kindness in 
sending us what must have cost you so much labour to write, and 
has given us so much pleasure to read.f 

I hope you have no mobs and no cholera ; fire upon the first, and 
go into the warm bath for the other, but do not imagine you will 
have no cholera in your neighbourhood. I do not altogether see 
why your coming here should depend on your going to town. 
Nothing does husband and wife so much good as occasional 
absences from home, and you could go nowhere where you would 
be more heartily received. 

I hear now and then from Lady Grey, and was delighted to learn 

* In the Prebendal Stall at St Paul's, given to him by Lord Grey. — Ed. 
f A beautiful song which Mr Smith had much admired when hearing it sung at 
Saltram by Lady E. Bulteel. 



492 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

from her last that my Lord was quite well again. I wish, for a 
thousand reasons, but for none more than the consideration of your 
father's health, that Reform was carried. There are persons who 
can govern kingdoms as gaily and with as much sang-froid as they 
would play at draughts : such is not the case with your excellent 
father ; affairs get into his heart and circulate with his blood. 

Pray remember me very kindly to Mr Bulteel, and believe me, 
dear Lady Elizabeth, ever sincerely yours, Sydney Smith. 



318.] To the Countess Grey. 

October, 1831. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

The only fault in your character is, that you never read my 
Taunton speeches ; though this may, perhaps, be accounted for by 
your porter never bringing you the papers, which I always send to 
you, as I have done this week. It seems absurd to make speeches 
in a little market-town ; but I have made a constant rule in party 
matters to contribute my quota, however insignificant, and to blow 
a trumpet, though it is but a penny trumpet. 

We are famous here for cheeses, called Cheddar cheeses ; and I 
have taken the liberty to send you one, made by a reforming farmer. 

Pray do not be good-natured about Bristol. I must have ten 
people hanged, and twenty transported, and thirty imprisoned ; it 
is absolutely necessary to give the multitude a severe blow, for 
their conduct at Bristol has been most atrocious. You will save 
lives by it in the end. There is no plea of want, as there was in 
the agricultural riots. Sydney Smith. 



319.] To the Countess Grey. 

Castle Hill, October, 1831. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I have anxiously reflected whether you mean to prorogue till 
after Christmas or not, and which is the better plan of proceeding. 
Supposing there had been no riots at Bristol, I should say, post- 
pone till after the Christmas holidays, and let some such letter as 
this find its way accidentally into the papers : — 

"My dear Lord, — I am very much obliged to you for placing 
before me so clearly your views respecting the present state of the 
country, and the policy which His Majesty's Ministers ought to 
pursue. I am so far from being offended at the liberty you have 
taken, that I feel grateful for your candour and your sincerity. It 
must occur to you, however, that your information, and that of any 
other individual not in His Majesty's Government, must necessarily 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 493 

be very imperfect ; and that, if we differ on what is to be done, it is 
most probably because we reason upon very different premises. 
You know me well enough to be aware that the character of my 
Administration, my only hope of deserving well of my country, my 
happiness, and most probably my health for the few years remain- 
ing to me, all depend upon the passing of this Bill. I have the 
most acute interest to decide properly upon the period at which it 
may be re-introduced to Parliament ; and I have information to 
guide me, which is, as it ought to be, accessible to very few persons 
besides myself. 

" I am thoroughly convinced that the best chance of carrying the 
Bill quietly and effectually through both Houses of Parliament is, 
by postponing its introduction till after Christmas. I have the 
strongest expectations that it will be so carried ; and you may be 
assured that my views and plans for that purpose would be mate- 
rially impeded and endangered, if I were to yield to the well- 
meaning importunities of my friends, and agree to an earlier period. 
I have been forty years before my country, in which I have never 
sacrificed an English interest for the love of office. Give me a few 
weeks of confidence, and you will see that I have served you faith- 
fully, honourably, and I firmly believe successfully, in this last 
struggle against corruption. Grey." 

These sentiments, put into Lord Grey's elegant and correct lan- 
guage, and published by mistake, would have a great effect. 

You must send down a special commission to Bristol, and hang 
ten people in the streets, and publish a proclamation. This done, I 
hardly think these riots need alter your plan of not meeting till after 
Christmas, if you have such a plan. I make no apology for writing 
my nonsense to you and Lord Grey. I prescribe for Lord Grey 
repeated doses of warm sal-volatile and water. Pray write me a line 
to say he is better, and give Macaulay a place. God bless you 
both ! Sydney Smith. 

P.S — (To Earl Grey.) — I take it for granted you are quite re' 
solved to make peers to an extent which may enable you to carry 
the measure. The measure is one of such indispensable necessity, 
that you will be completely justified by public opinion, and as com- 
pletely overwhelmed by public opinion if you shrink from such a 
step ; so I have done with this. 

Cultivate Whishaw : he is one of the most sensible men in Eng- 
land, and his opinions valuable, if he will give them. It would give 
great satisfaction if a prebend were in course of time given to 

Malthus. Lord 's brother is a good scholar, a gentleman, with 

a mind not unecclesiastical, thoroughly honest, and to be depended 



494 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

upon. Caldwell is fit for any ecclesiastical situation, for his pru- 
dence, sense, character, and honesty ; — a great friend of Whishaw's 
Wood will tell you about — — ; you may trust him as long as you 
have anything to give him. Wait till after Christmas for the meet' 
ing of Parliament. I am sure this is right. I give you great credit 
for Lamb's Conduit Fields. 

Pray keep well, and do your best, with a gay and careless heart. 
What is it all, but the scratching of pismires upon a heap of earth? 
Rogues are careless and gay, why not honest men ? Think of the 
Bill in the morning, and take your claret in the evening, totally for- 
getting the Bill. You have done admirably up to this time. 



320.] To the Countess Grey. 

20 Saville Row, December, 1831. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I went to the debate. Lord and Lord were horrible. 

I wish apologies were abolished by Act of Parliament. They are 
all children to Lord Grey. He made an excellent speech, as prudent 
as it was spirited. 

I submit the following little criticisms. Lord Grey should stand 
farther from the bench, and more in the body of the house ; should 
stand more upright, and raise his arm (which no Englishman does, 
and all foreigners do) from the shoulder, and not from the elbow. 
But he speaks beautifully, and is a torch among tapers. Next to 
Lord Grey, I like Lord Harrowby ; Lord speaks like a school- 
boy. The whole debate was rather conciliatory. Yours affection- 
ately, Sydney Smith. 

321.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey, December, 1831. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

I behave well, always well, but you have a little infirmity, — 
tactility, or touchiness. Pray guard against this ; it grows upon 
you ; and do not be angry with me for telling you this, for that 
would be an odd way of proving you were innocent of the 
charge. 

Lord Grey is well ; the King firm ; the Bill will pass, partly by 
the defalcation of its opponents, partly by the creation of peers. 
Cholera will spread all over England. Read nothing about it, and 
say nothing about it ; but when you are in the cold stage, send for 
one of my letters and place it near your heart, and your foolish 
doctor will ascribe your recovery to himself. 

I had no idea Mrs Partington would make such a fortune ; I sent 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 495 

my speech to nobody, but it was copied into the "Times." I am 
told it is up at the caricature shops, but I did not see it. Yout 
faithful and affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 



322.] To the Countess of Morley. 

Bristol^ 1 83 1. 
Dear Lady Morley, 

I have taken possession of my preferment. The house is in 
Amen-corner, — an awkward name on a card, and an awkward 
annunciation to the coachman on leaving any fashionable man- 
sion. I find too (sweet discovery !) that I give a dinner every Sun- 
day, for three months in the year, to six clergymen and six singing- 
men, at one o'clock. Do me the favour to drop in as Mrs Morley. 
I did the duty at St Paul's ; the organ and music were excellent. 

Seeing several carpenters at work at Lord Dudley's, I called ; and 
after he had expatiated at some length on the danger of the times, I 
learnt that he was boarding up his windows in imitation of the Duke 
of Wellington, who has been fortified in a similar manner ever since 
the Coronation. I am afraid the Lords will fling out the Bill, and 
that I shall pocket the sovereign of Mr Bulteel ; in that case, I 
believe and trust Lord Grey will have recourse to peer-making. 

I went to Court, and, horrible to relate ! with strings to my shoes 
instead of buckles, — not from Jacobinism, but ignorance. I saw 
two or three Tory lords looking at me with dismay, was informed 
by the Clerk of the Closet of my sin, and gathering my sacerdotal 
petticoats about me (like a lady conscious of thick ankles) I 
escaped further observation. My residence is in February, March, 
and July. 

Lady Holland is to have an express from the Lords every ten 
minutes, and is encamped for that purpose in Burlington Street. 
Adieu, dear Lady Morley ! Excuse my nonsense. A thousand 
thanks for your hospitality and good-nature. 

Sydney Smith. 

323.] To the Countess of Morley. 

Saville Row, 183 1. 
Dear Lady Morley, 
No news. War against Holland, which may possibly swell into 
a general war. 

— — has been to Cambridge to place his son ; in other words, 
he has put him there to spend his money, to lose what good quali- 
ties he has, and to gam nothing useful in return. If men had 
made no more progress in the common arts of life than they have 



496 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

in education, we should at this moment be dividing our food with 
our fingers, and drinking out of the palms of our hands. 

I shall be at home to receive you in a few days. Why should 
you suppose, because you have more sense and wit than other 
people, that you should have less feeling and compassion for the 
real miseries of your fellow-creatures ? In discussing this subject, 

I have always some individual widow in my mind ; was the 

last ; if I succeeded, to her be the glory. Be assured Lord Plunket 
is devoted to you ; and next to him, your sincerely obliged clergy- 
man, Sydney Smith. 



324.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florcy. Jan. 7, 1 832. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I hope to see you in the middle of this month ; in the meantime 
a few words. 

The delay has had this good, that it will make the creation of 
peers less surprising and alarming ; everybody expects it, as a 
matter of course. I am for forty, to make things safe in committees. 
I liked Lord Grey's letter to Lord Ebrington. I am a great friend 
to these indirect communications in a free Government. Pray beg 
of Lord Grey to keep well. He has the thing on hand, and I have 
no doubt of a favourable issue. I see an open sea beyond the ice- 
bergs. I am afraid the Muscovite meditates war. Perhaps he is 
only saying to the French, " Don't go too far ; for my eye is upon 
you, and my paw shall be so also, if you run riot." You may per- 
haps be forced to take O'Connell by the throat. 

I cannot get the Bishop of to pay me my dilapidations. He 

keeps on saying he will pay, but the money does not appear ; I 
shall seize his mitre, robes, sermons, and charges to his clergy, and 
put them up to auction. 

We have had the mildest weather possible. A great part of the 
vegetable world is deceived, and beginning to blossom, — not merely 
foolish young plants without experience, but old plants that have 
been deceived before by premature springs ; and for such one has 

no pity. It is as if Lady were to complain of being seduced 

and betrayed. 

I cannot tell what has happened to our Church of St Paul. I 
have belonged to him for four months ; he has cost me two or 
three hundred pounds, and I have not received a shilling from 
him. I hope to find him in a more munificent mood the ensuing 
quarter. Yours most respectfully and affectionately, 

Sydney Smith, 



[JITTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 497 

325.] To the Countess Grey. 

Supposed 1832. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I did not like to say much to you about public affairs to-day, 
because I thought you were not well, but I must take the weight 
off my soul ! I am alarmed for Lord Grey ; so are many others. 

Is there a strong probability, amounting almost to a certainty, 
that the Bill will be carried without a creation of peers ? No.— 
Then make them. But the King will 11 ot. — Then resign. But if 
the King will create, we shall lose more than we gain. — I doubt it. 
Many threaten, who will not vote against the Bill. — At all events, 
you will have done all you can to carry it. If you do create, and it 
fail, you are beaten with honour ; and the country will distinguish 
between its enemies and its friends. 

The same reason applies to dissensions in the Cabinet, of which 
(though perhaps unfounded) I have heard many rumours. Turn 
out the anti-Reformers ; you will then be either victorious, or 
defeated with honour. You are just in that predicament in which 
the greatest boldness is the greatest prudence. You must either 
carry the Bill, or make it as clear as day that you have done all in 
your power to do so. There is not a moment to lose. The char- 
acter of Lord Grey is a valuable public possession. It would be a 
very serious injury if it were destroyed, and there will be no public 
man in whom the people will place the smallest confidence. Lord 
Grey must say to his colleagues to-morrow : " Brothers, the time 
draws near ; you must choose this day between good and evil ; 
either you or I must perish this night, before the sun falls. I am 
sure the Bill will not pass without a creation; it may pass with one. 
It is the only expedient for doing what, from the bottom of my 
heart, I believe the country requires. I will create, and create 
immediately ; or resign." 

Mackintosh, Whishaw, Robert Smith, Rogers, Luttrell, Jeffrey, 
Sharpe, Ord, Macaulay, Fazakerly, Lord Ebrington — where will 
you find a better jury, one more able and more willing to consider 
every point connected with the honour, character, and fame of 
Lord Grey ? There would not be among them a dissentient 
voice. 

If you wish to be happy three months hence, create peers. If 
you wish to avoid an old age of sorrow and reproach, create peers. 
If you wish to retain my friendship, it is of no sort of consequence 
whether you create peers or not ; I shall always retain for you the 
most sincere gratitude and affection, without the slightest reference 
to your political wisdom or your political errors ; and may God 

2 I 



498 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

bless and support you and Lord Grey in one of the most difficult 
moments that ever occurred to any public man ! 

Sydney Smith. 

[Though the natural reluctance of Lord Grey to have recourse to this extreme measure 
was shared by every member of the Cabinet, with greater or less strength, they were 
fully agreed that, if the Reform Bill could be carried by no other means, that must be 
resorted to. Lord Grey accordingly took to the King their unanimous resolution, that 
they must have the power to create peers to any extent they might deem necessary. 
Fortunately, they were not compelled to exercise it.— Ed.] 



326.] To the Countess Grey. 

May 17, 1832. 
I sent you yesterday, my dear Lady Grey, another penny trumpet, 
blown at your political funeral. I wish you joy most heartily of 
your resurrection. Accept for Lord Grey and yourself my most 
sincere congratulations. You are now beyond the reach of acci- 
dents, and I hope will enjoy two or three years of entertaining 
dominion ; more I am sure you do not want, if so much. 

Sydney Smith. 

327.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Aug. 27, 1832. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Are you gone to Ho wick ? You must have great pleasure, the 
greatest pleasure, in going there triumphant and all-powerful. It 
must be, I fear, a hasty pleasure, and that you cannot be long 
spared. 

One of your greatest difficulties is the Church ; you must posi- 
tively, in the course of the first session, make a provision for the 
Catholic clergy of Ireland, and make it out of the revenues of the 
Irish Protestant Church. I have in vain raked my brains to think 
how this can be avoided, but it cannot. It will divide the Cabinet 
and agitate the country, but you must face the danger and conquer, 
or be conquered by it. It cannot be delayed. There is no alter- 
native between this and a bloody war, and reconquest of Ireland. 
I hope you will, if possible, make the Bishops bring in their own 
Reform Bill. They will throw it on the Government if they can. 
I foresee the probability of a Protestant tempest ; but you must 
keep the sea, and not run into harbour : such indeed is not your 
practice. The Tories are daunted and intimidated here, and I think 
the members returned will be Reformers. Pray put down the 
unions as soon as Parliament meets. 

We are all well. Cholera has made one successful effort at 
Taunton, and not repeated it, though a month has elapsed. Lord 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 499 

John Russell comes here on Saturday, and the Fazakerlys on 
Friday ; so we shall be a strong Reform party for a few days. My 
butler said, in the kitchen, " he should let the country people peep 
through the shutters at Lord John for a penny apiece." A very 
reasonable price. I wonder what he would charge for Lord Grey 
if he should come here. 

The cholera will have killed by the end of the year about one 
person in every thousand. Therefore it is a thousand to one (sup- 
posing the cholera to travel at the same rate) that any person does 
not die of the cholera in any one year. This calculation is for the 
mass ; but if you are prudent, temperate, and rich, your chance is 
at least five times as good that you do not die of the cholera, — in 
other words, five thousand to one that you do not die of cholera in 
a year ; it is not far from two millions to one that you do not die 
any one day from cholera. It is only seven hundred and thirty 
thousand to one that your house is not burnt down any one day. 
Therefore it is nearly three times as likely that your house should 
be burnt down any one day, as that you should die of cholera ; or, 
it is as probable that your house should be burnt down three times 
in any one year, as that you should die of cholera. 

An enormous harvest here, and every appearance of peace and 
plenty. God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! My very kind regards 
to Lord Grey and Georgiana. Sydney Smith. 



328.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe Florey, 1832. 

I am truly sorry, my dear Lady Holland, to hear such bad 
accounts of Holland House. I am always inquiring about you 
from all London people, and can hear nothing that pleases me. 
Try if you cannot send me some more agreeable intelligence. 

We have had several people here ; among the rest, poor dear 
Whishaw and John Romilly. I was quite alarmed to hear of his 
fall, but he was good enough to write us a line to-day. He should 
never lay aside a crutch-stick, after the manner of Lord Holland. 

Luttrell comes here next week, and has appeared by excuse> 

in his usual manner. We are just returned from Linton and 
Lymouth ; — the finest thing in England, and pronounced by three 
Mediterranean gentlemen, who were present, to be equal to any- 
thing in that sea. The Fazakerlys came there by accident, and to 
the same house where we were staying. Nobody to me more 
agreeable than Fazakerly. 

The accounts, I am sorry to say, are not very good of Lord John's 
success in Devonshire. The Whigs whom I saw at Linton looked 
very black about it. We have had a delightful summer, and every- 



50o LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

body has been pleased with our place ; nobody more so than 
Whishaw. By the by, let me say a word about John Romilly ; a 
very agreeable and a very well-informed young man; — very candid, 
though a doctrinaire, with very good abilities, and legal abilities 
too, such as I am sure will ensure his success. The whole effect 
of him, to me, is very agreeable. I hear that the success of Jeffrey 
and Murray is certain ; that of Abercromby doubtful. S. S. 



329.] To John Allen, Esq. 

Nov. 3, 1832. 
My dear Allen, 
I saw Mackintosh : he wishes that his father's work should be as 
he left it, without any addition ; in other words, the statue, without 
a modern nose or arm. Upon reflection, I should feel as he does : 
pray talk to Lord Holland on the subject, and send me your united 
opinions. We are the natural guardians of Mackintosh's literary 
fame ; will that not be in some degree tainted and exposed to ridi- 
cule, if his history is furnished by a regular Paternoster hack? 
My leaning is, that such would be the consequence ; and I told 
Mackintosh I would consult Holland House and tell him the 
result, but that I leant to his opinions. Believe me, truly yours, 
Sydney Smith. 

330.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Combe Florey, Nov. 21, 1832. 
My dear Friend, 

Do not imagine I have heard with indifference of your success, 
or that of Giant Jeffrey. It has given me the most sincere plea- 
sure. The gods are said to rejoice at the sight of a wise man 
struggling with adversity. The gods will please themselves ; but I 
like to see wise men better when the struggle is over, and when 
they are in the enjoyment of that power and distinction to which, 
by their long labour and their merits, they are so justly entitled. 

I am afraid of the war. Whether our friends could have avoided 
it or not, I know not, but it will be dreadfully unpopular ; I should 
not be surprised if it were fatal to them. Pray say if Abercromby 
is sure of his election. His ambition is to be Speaker, and I should 
not be surprised if he succeeded. He is the wisest-looking man I 
know. It is said he can see through millstones and granite. 

What oceans of absurdity and nonsense will the new liberties 
of Scotland disclose ! Yet this is better than the old infamous 
jobbing, and the foolocracy under which it has so long laboured. 
Don't be too ardent, Johnny, and restrain yourself; and don't get 
into scrapes by phrases, but get the character of a very prudent 



\ 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 501 

practical man. I remain here in a state of very iner. vegetation 
till the end of February, and then we meet in London. Pray take 
care that Jeffrey is the first Judge. I have that much at heart ; 
and to thwart him in that nonsense about Cockburn. I have done 
all I ca.i to effect the same object. 

We are living here with windows all open, and eating our own 
ripe grapes grown in the open air ; but, in revenge, there is no man 
within twenty miles who knows anything of history or angles, or of 
the mind. I send Mrs Murray my epigram on Professor Airey, 
of Cambridge, the great astronomer and mathematician, and his 
beautiful wife : — 

Airey alone has gain'd that double prize 
Which forced musicians to divide the crown : 

His works have raised a mortal to the skies, 
His marriage-vows have drawn an angel down. 

s. s. 



331.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe F/orej', Dec. 16, 1832. 
Dear Mrs Meynell, 

I often think of you, though I do not write to you. I am 
delighted to find the elections have gone so well. The blackguards 
and democrats have been defeated almost universally, and I hope 
Meynell is less alarmed, though I am afraid he never will forgive 
me Mrs Partington ; in return I have taken no part in the county 
election, and am behaving quite like a dignitary of the Church ; 
that is, I am confining myself to digestion. 

Read Memoirs of Constant, Buonaparte's valet-de-chambre, and 
Mrs Trollope's " Refugees in America." The story is foolish, but 
the picture of American manners excellent ; and why should not 
the Americans be ridiculed if they are ridiculous ? 

I see no prospect of a change of Ministry, but think the Whigs 
much stronger than they were when we were in town. I have come 
to the end of my career, and have nothing now to do but to grow 
old merrily and to die without pain. Yours, Sydney Smith. 



332.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe Florey^ Dec. 22, 1832. 
My dear Philips, 
You seem to have had a neck-and-neck race ; however, if the 
breath is out of his body, that is all that was wanted. I congratu- 
late you upon the event ; and, considering what it may lead to in 
George's instance, it is an ample indemnification for the defeat of 
Kidderminster. You must keep away from the House, and then no 



502 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

harm will follow ; and now Birmingham has Members of its own, 
the county Members will be less wanted. I can only say. thank 
God I am not in the House of Commons. Our election here is con- 
tested by the obstinate perseverance of a Mr , who, without a 

shadow of chance, has put the other Members to the expense of a 
poll. Many decayed eggs have been cast upon him, which have 
much defiled his garments ; and this is all, as far as I can see or 
smell, that he has acquired by his exertions. We have been a good 

deal amused by seeing Sir perform the part of patriot and 

Church reformer. 

• We have read "Zohrab the Hostage" with the greatest pleasure. 
If you have not read it, pray do ; I was so pleased with it that I 
could not help writing a letter of congratulation and collaudation to 
Morier, the author, who, by the by, is an excellent man. 

I see Lord Grey, the Chancellor, and the Archbishop of Canter- 
bury have had a meeting, which I suppose has decided the fate of 
the Church. Ever yours, my dear Philips, Sydney Smith. 



333.] To Lord Holland. 

Combe Florey, Jan. 22, 1833. 
My dear Lord Holland, 
Nothing can be of so little consequence as what I write, or do 
not write ; but I wish to own only the trumpery good, or the trum- 
pery evil, of which I am the author. A pamphlet, called the 
" Logan Stone" (which I conjecture to be one of conservation and 
alarm), has been attributed to me. I give you my honour I have 
neither written nor read a line of it. If by chance it is mentioned 
before you, pray say what I say. Sydney Smith. 



334.] To Lord Holland. 

Combe Florey, Jan 25, 1833. 

I do not think my short and humble epistle deserves the merciless 
quizzing it has received to-night. No man likes to have writings 
imputed to him which he did not write ; and, above all, when those 
works are an attack upon old friends to whom he is under the 
greatest obligations. ... S.S. 

335.] To the Countess of Morley. 

Combe Florey, January, 1833. 
Dear Lady Morley, 
As this is the season for charades and bad pleasantry, I shall say, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 503 

from a very common appellation for Palestine, remove the syllable 
of which egotists are so fond, and you will have the name of the 
other party which the report concerns ; but I repeat again, we as 
yet know nothing about it. Stapleton's letter is decisive, and puts 
an end to the question. You have no idea how the sacred Valley 
of Flowers has improved ever since you were here ; but I hope you 
will, before the year is over, come and see. Mrs Sydney allows me 
to accept the present you sent me ; I stick it in my heart, as P. B. 
sticks a rose in his button-hole. . . . Do you want a butler or 
respectable-looking groom of the chambers ? I will be happy to 
serve you in either capacity ; it is time for the clergy to look out. 
I have also a cassock and stock of sermons to dispose of, dry and 
fit for use. Sydney Smith. 

336.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 22, 1833. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I hope you are all well after the fatigues of London, and enjoying 
the North as much as I do the West. I can conceive no greater 
happiness than that of a Minister in such times escaping to his 
country-seat. The discharged debtor, — the bird escaped from the 
cage-door, have no feelings of liberty which equal it. Have you 
any company ? For your own sakes, I wish not. You must be 
sick of the human countenance, and it must be a relief to you to see 
a cow instead of a Christian. We have had here the Morleys and 
Lady Davy, and many others unknown to you. Our evils have 
been, want of rain, and scarlet-fever in our village, where, in three- 
quarters of a year, we have buried fifteen, instead of one, per 
annum. You will naturally suppose I have killed all these people 
by doctoring them; but scarlet-fever awes me, and is above my aim. 
I leave it to the professional and graduated homicides. 

The s are with us. Mrs confined to her sofa a close 

prisoner. I was forced to decline seeing Malthus, who came this 
way. I am convinced her last accident was entirely owing to his 
visit. 

I am so engaged in the nonsensical details of a country life, that 
I have hardly looked at a book ; the only one I have read with 
pleasure is Sturt's "Discoveries in New Holland." There must be 
a great degree of felony and larceny in my composition, for I have 
great curiosity about that country ; and if Lord Grey's friendship 
and kindness had left me anything to desire, I should ask to be 
Governor of Botany Bay. Sydney Smith. 



504 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



2}/.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

Wobum Abbey, Dec. 4, 1833. 

An old and sincere friend feels deeply for your loss, recollecting 
the ancient kindness of Castle Howard, and the many happy days 
he has spent there. 

It is impossible not to meet with affliction, but it is some com- 
fort to think that many others grieve with our grief, and are think- 
ing of us with deep and honest concern. God bless you, dear Lady 
Carlisle ! I exhort you to firmness and courage, for there are in 
your mind those foundations on which the best courage is built. 

S. S. 



338.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Combe Florey, Taunton, Dec. 24, 1833. 
My dear John, 

Pray send me a word or two respecting Scotland and Scotch 
friends. Is it true that one of the Scotch Judges is about to resign 
either life or place ? and will Jeffrey succeed him ? This will be 
very agreeable news to me, for I wish to see him in port. We are 
becoming quiet and careless here. What is your state in Scotland ? 
I begin to hope we shall not have a revolution, though perhaps I 
am too sanguine. 

Read Hamilton's " America/' — excellent, and yet unjust. Sup- 
pose a well-bred man to travel in stage-coaches, and to live at 
ordinaries here ; what would be his estimate of England and 
Englishmen ? 

We are living here with open windows, and complaining of the 
heat. Remember me kindly to Jus and Pus Thompson,* and to 
Mr Rutherford. I regret sincerely I am so far from Edinburgh. 
God bless you, dear John ! Sydney Smith. 



339.] To Mrs Meynell. 

December, 1833. 
My dear G., 

The Ministers, you will admit (all Tory as you are), have at least 
sent you a most respectable man and gentleman as Dean of Lich- 
field. His style is, that he is a scholar, with much good sense, and 
with the heart of a gentleman. He was my next-door neighbour in 
Yorkshire, and I know him well. 

We shall.be in town the 18th of February: but if there is any 
chance of seeing you in town at all, it will be in July, one of my 

* The Edinburgh lawyer and physician of that name were so distinguished by Mr 
Sydney Smith — Ed. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



5^5 



months of residence. Pray give over hunting. Ask Meynell to 
leave off. He has been pursuing the fox for thirty years. Glory 
has its limits, like any other pursuit. 

I passed an agreeable month in London, finding the town full of 
my acquaintances and friends. I went to Brighton, which pleased 
me much ; and visited the Duke of Bedford and Lord Lansdowne, 
at their country places. I admire the Duchess of Bedford for her 
wit and beauty. How are all your children ? How are you ? 

Sydney Smith. 

340.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe E/orey, May 23, 1834. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
Pray make Lord Grey read the enclosed copy of my letter to the 
Chancellor. There is nobody to take the part of the parish clergy; 
they are left to be tormented by laws and by bishops, as frogs and 
rabbits are given up to the experiments of natural philosophers. 
In a few years your clergy will become mean and fanatical. Ever 
affectionately yours, Sydney Smith. 



341.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe E/orey, July, 1834. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

The thought was sudden, so was the execution : I saw I was 
making no progress in London, and I resolved to run the risk of 
the journey. I performed it with pain, and found on my arrival at 
my own door my new carriage completely disabled. I called on no 
one, but went away without beat of drum. I know nothing of public 
affairs — I have no pleasure in thinking of them, and turn my face 
the other way, deeply regretting the abrupt and unpleasant termina- 
tion of Lord Grey's political life. 

I am making a slow recovery ; hardly yet able to walk across 
the room, nor to put on a Christian shoe. On Monday I shall 
have been ill for a month. Perhaps it is a perquisite of my time 
of life, to have the gout or some formidable illness. We enter and 
quit the world in pain ! but let us be just however ; I find my eye- 
sight much improved by gout, and I am not low-spirited. 

Pray let me hear from you from time to time, as you shall from 
me. Remember me to the handsome widow with handsome 
daughters ; and believe me. my dear G., yours affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 



506 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

342.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Oct. 12, 1834. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I should be glad to hear a word about the dinner ; you must 
have been in the seventh heaven. I am heartily rejoiced at the 
great honours Lord Grey has received, and which I am sure will 
give him great pleasure in retirement. 

I have spent a summer of sickness, never having been ten days 
without some return of gout or ophthalmia ; at present I am very 
well, and laying up the aliments and elements of future illnesses. 
I shall be in London the 1st of November with Mrs Sydney, in 
Weymouth Street, where you paid me those charitable visits ; for 
which, God's blessing be upon you ! 

I think has damaged the Administration from ten to twenty 

per cent. I wish our friend would not speak so much. I 

really cannot agree with him about Reform. I am for no more 
movements : they are not relished by Canons of St Paul's. When 
I say, " no more movements," however, I except the case of the 
Universities ; which, I think, ought to be immediately invaded 
with Inquirers and Commissioners. They are a crying evil. 

I have had a great number of persons coming to Combe Florey. 
They all profess themselves converts to the beauty of the country. 

Terrible work with the new Poor Law ! Nobody knows what to 
do, or which way to go. How did Lord Grey stand all his fatigues ? 

Has Rogers been with you ? Who should pay me a visit but P 

B ! His very look turns country into Piccadilly. 

Sydney Smith. 

343.] To Mrs Baring. 

Weymouth Street, Portland Place, 1834. 
Dear Mrs Baring, 
I have a favour to ask : could you lend our side such a thing as 
a Chancellor of the Exchequer ? Some of our people are too little, 
— some too much in love, — some too ill. We will take great care 
of him, and return him so improved you will hardly know him. 

You will be glad to hear my eyes are better — nearly well. Ever 
sincerely yours, Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — What is real piety? What is true attachment to the 
Church ? How are these fine feelings best evinced ? The answer 
is plain : by sending strawberries to a clergyman. Many thanks. 

S. S. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 507 

344.] To Mrs Baring. 

Combe Florey, October, 1834. 
Dear Mrs Baring, 

L has just left us. We all think him a very excellent and 

agreeable man ; but wholly ignorant, for the greatest part of the 
day, of our names and parish, and not very certain of his own. 

See what you lose by being a Tory; your son might have been 
Bishop of Bristol; a very lean and ill-fed piece of preferment (it is 
true), but a passage to better things. Ever very sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

345.] To John Murray, Esq. 

November, 1834. 
My dear Murray, 

Many and sincere thanks for the grouse. I shall be heartily glad 
if you are returned. The fact is, the Whig Ministry were nearly 
dissolved before the King put them to death ; they were weakened 
by continual sloughing. They could not have stood a month in 
the Commons. The King put them out of their misery j in which, 
I think, he did a very foolish thing. 

The meetings in London are generally considered as failures. I 

was invited to dine with Lord . The party was curious : Lady 

, Mrs F L , Barnes (the Editor of the " Times "), my- 
self, and the Duke of Wellington. I was ill, and sent an excuse. 
Do not imagine I am going to rat. I am a thoroughly honest, and, 
I will say, liberal person, but have never given way to that Puritan- 
ical feeling of the Whigs against dining with Tories. 

Tory and Whig in turns shall be my host, 
I taste no politics in boil'd and roast 

s. s. 



346.] To the Countess Grey. 

London, November 19, 1834. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
Nothing can exceed the fury of the Whigs ! They mean not 
only to change everything upon the earth, but to alter the tides, to 
suspend the principles of gravitation and vegetation, and to tear 
down the solar system. The Duke's success, as it appears to me, 
will entirely depend on his imitation of the Whig measures. I am 
heartily glad Lord Grey is in port. I am (thanks to him) in port 
too, and have no intentions of resigning St Paul's. / have not re- 
signed. Still the King has used them ill. • If he always intended 
to turn them out as soon as Lord Spencer died, he should have told 
Lord Melbourne so, and not have placed him in so awkward a 



5oS LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

position ; at least, as far as circumstances over which he has no 
control can place an able and high-minded man. 

I am better in health, avoiding all fermented liquors, and drink- 
ing nothing but London water, with a million insects in every drop. 
He who drinks a tumbler of London water has literally in his 
stomach more animated beings than there are men, women, and 
children on the face of the globe. London is very empty, but by no 
means disagreeable : I find plenty of friends. Pray be in London 
early in January. I shall practise as I preach, and be there from 
January till Easter. 

It is supposed that the messenger who is gone to fetch Sir 
Robert Peel, will not catch him before he is at Paestum ; in the 
meantime, the Duke of Wellington holds all offices, civil, military, 
and ecclesiastical, and is to be Bishop of Ely (if Ely dies), till Peel 
arrives. Sydney Smith. 

347.] To the Countess Grey. 

No date : supposed 1834. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

There departs from Taunton this day my annual quit-rent cheese, 
and with it my hearty thanks and gratitude for the comfort and 
independence I have derived from the kindness of Lord Grey. We 
are all well, and mean to be in town by the 19th of next month. 
There is a report that we are going to be married, but I know 
nothing about it. If we are married, and the report proves to be 
true, I shall advertise for a daughter ; I cannot possibly get on 
without a daughter ; but I suppose it is only an idle rumour. Mild 
weather, the windows open, and thirty sorts of flowers blowing in 
the garden. 

They seem to have given up the idea of your resigning. When I 
came down here, I found everybody sure you were upon the eve 
of abdication. I wish the Cabinet would do something about the 
rain, — it is eternal ; and as the road to Taunton is sometimes 
covered with floods, we are cut off from butchers, doctors, tailors, 
and all who supply the wants of life. 

As I know you are a good scholar, you may say to Lord Grey for 
me, — 

Precor ut hie annus tibi laetis auspiciis 
Ineat, laetioribus procedat, lsetissimis exeat, 
Et ssepius recurrat semper felicior. 

s. s. 

348.] To Mrs Holland. 

{Soon after her marriage), 1834. 

The blessing of God be upon you both, dear children ; and be 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 509 

assured that it makes my old age much happier to have placed my 
amiable daughter in the hands of so honourable and so amiable a 
son. From your affectionate father, Sydney Smith. 



349.] To the Countess Grey. 

18 Stratford Place, Jan. 14, 1835. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I believe the new Ministry are preparing some great coufi-de- 
theatre, and that when the curtain draws up there will be seen, 
ready prepared, — Abolition of Pluralities, Commutation of Tithes, 
Provision for the Catholic Clergy, &c. Somebody asked Peel the 
other day how the elections were going on. Peel said, " I know 
very little about them, and, in truth, I care little ; we have such 
plans as I think will silence all opposition, or at least such as will 
conciliate all reasonable men." Do not doubt that he said this. 

I was last week on crutches with the gout, and it came into my 
eye ; but by means of colchicum I can now see and walk. Of 
course I had the best advice. I write to you, not to make you write 

to me, — for what can you tell me, where you are, but that C , of 

C , is well or ill? — but because I am in London, and you are 

not. You may say that you are happy out of office, but I have great 
disbelief on this subject. Sydney Smith. 



350.] To Sir Wilmot Horton, Bart. 

January 15, 1835. 
Dear Horton,* 

It is impossible to say what the result of all these changes may 
be. I do not think there is any chance of the Tories being suf- 
focated at the first moment by a denial of confidence ; if the more 
heated Whigs were to attempt it, the more moderate ones would 
resist it. If I were forced to give an opinion, I should say Peel's 
government would last through a session ; and a session is, in the 
present state of politics, an eternity. But the remaining reforms, 
rule who may, must go on. The Trojans must put on the armour 
of the Greeks whom they have defeated. 

Never was astonishment equal to that produced by the dismissal 
of the Whigs. I thought it better at first to ascertain whether the 
common laws of nature were suspended ; and to put this to the test, 
I sowed a little mustard and cress seed, and waited in breathless 
anxiety the event. It came up. By little and little I perceived that, 
as far as the outward world was concerned, the dismissal of Lord 
Melbourne has not produced much effect. 

I met T yesterday at Lady Williams's, a sensible and very 

* Sir Wilmot Horton was at this time Governor of Ceylon. 



5io LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

good-natured man, and so stout that I think there are few wild 
elephants who would care to meet him in the wood. I am turned 
a gouty old gentleman, and am afraid I shall not pass a green old 
age, but, on the contrary, a blue one ; or rather, that I shall be 
spared the trouble of passing any old age at all. Poor Malthus ! 
— everybody regrets him ; — in science and in conduct equally a 
philosopher, one of the most practically wise men I ever met, 
shamefully mistaken and unjustly calumniated, and receiving no 
mark of favour from a Liberal Government, who ought to have inter- 
ested themselves in the fortunes of such a virtuous martyr to truth. 

1 hope you will disorient yourself soon. The departure of the 
wise men from the East seems to have been on a more extensive 
scale than is generally supposed, for no one of that description 
seems to have been left behind. Come back to Europe, where only 
life is worth having, where that excellent man and governor, Lord 
Clare, is returning, and where so many friends are waiting to receive 
you a bras ouverts, — among the rest the Berries, whom I may call 
fully ripe at present, and who may, if your stay is protracted, pass 
that point of vegetable perfection, and exhibit some faint tendency 
to decomposition. 

The idea lately was, that Lord would go to India, but they 

are afraid his religious scruples would interfere with the prejudices 
of the Hindoos. This may be so ; but surely the moral purity of 
his life must have excited their admiration. I beg my kind and 
(an old parson may say) my affectionate regards to Lady H or ton. 
Yours, my dear Horton, very sincerely, Sydney Smith. 



351.] To the Countess Grey. 

February 4, 1835. 

A few words to dear Lady Grey. Since has taken the field, 

both parties are become more bloody-minded, and a civil war is 
expected. The arch-Radicals allow a return of two hundred and 
sixty Tories, and count upon fifteen Stanleians. This was War- 
burton's statement to me the other day. Tories claim more ; but, 
by the admission of their greatest enemies, they are, you see, the 
strongest of the four parties in the House of Commons. I missed 
Howick's speech. He is a very honest and clever man, and a 
valuable politician. 

My daughter, Mrs Holland, was confined three or four days ago 
of a little girl, and is doing very well. I am glad it is a girl ; all 
little boys ought to be put to death. 

Thank you for the speech. Very good and very honest. I agree 
with you entirely as to the difficulty of finding anybody in the relics 
of the Whigs fit to govern the country. and , who have 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 511 

every other qualification for governing, want that legion of devils 
in the interior, without whose aid mankind cannot be ruled. 

I have no doubt whatever that Sir Robert Peel is sincere in his 
Church Reform. Bishops nearly equalised, — pluralities, canons, 
and prebendaries abolished, — tithes commuted, — and residence 
enforced. A much more severe bill than Whigs could have ven- 
tured upon. 

Pray excuse my writing to you so often ; but I am learning to 
write clear and straight, and it is necessary I should write a letter 
every day. I hear you are to be here by the end of the month. If 
you put it off for a week or two, you will perhaps not be here till the 
end of the Monarchy. Your affectionate chaplain, 

Sydney Smith. 



352.] To Mrs . 

18 Stratford Place, Feb. 22, 1835. 

Dear Mrs , 

Many thanks for your kind attention. I read half a volume last 
night ; — but why dialogue? I thought that dialogue, allegory, and 
religious persecution were quite given up ; and that mankind, in 
these points at least, had profited by experience. 

I will tell you what I think of the authoress when I have read 
her, which I will do soon, — not from supposing that you will be 
impatient for my opinions, but for your books ; and yet I should 
not say this of you, for God has written, in a large hand, benevo- 
lence and kindness on your countenance. Very truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

353.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe Florey, May 14, 1835. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I hope office agrees with you, and that office is likely to con- 
tinue. I congratulate you sincerely on recovering the Duchy of 
Lancaster. We are sad Protestants in the West of England, 
and can on no account put up with the Pope. Johnny is lucky to 
have got away alive ; he was to have come here if he had triumphed. 
It seems rather a ridiculous position of affairs, when neither of the 
Secretaries has a seat in Parliament. 

You always accuse me of grumbling against my party. As a 
refutation of that calumny, I send you my declaration of faith. I 
will take good care you shall never make me a bishop ; but if all 
your future Whig bishops would speak out as plainly, little Johns 
would not be driven away from large counties. Lord Melbourne 
always thinks that man best qualified for any office, of whom he 



512 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

has seen and known the least. Liberals of the eleventh hour 
abound ! and there are some of the first hour, of whose works in 
the toil and heat of the day I have no recollection. 

I cannot tell you the pleasure Morpeth's success has given to us 
here. The servants, who are all Yorkshire, and from the neigh- 
bourhood of Castle Howard, are in an ecstasy. It has saved dear 
Lady Carlisle from a great deal of nervousness and mortification. 

Lord Alvanley is equal to Britomart or Amadis de Gaul. I thank 
him in the name of the fat men, for the noble stand he has made 
for circumference and diameter. Your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



Extract from the " Taunton Courier? enclosed in the foregoing 
letter. 

To Mr Bunter. 
Sir, 

You have done me the honour, in your own name and in that of 
your brother requisitionists, to invite me to the meeting holden 
this day at Taunton. I am really so heartily tired of meetings and 
speeches that I must be excused ; but I agree with you in your 
main objects. 

It appears to me quite impossible that the Irish Church can 
remain in its present state. Vested interests strictly guarded, and 
the spiritual wants of the Protestants of the Establishment pro- 
vided for, the remainder may wisely and justly be applied to the 
religious education of other sects. I go further : and think that 
the Catholic Clergy of Ireland should receive a provision from the 
State equal to that which they are at present compelled to extort 
from the peasantry of that country. All other measures without 
this I cannot but consider as insignificant ; and it may be as well 
conceded now, as after years of bloodshed and contention. This, 
with time, and a long course of strict impartiality in the Government 
between Catholic and Protestant, may restore tranquillity to that 
light, irritable, and ill-used people. 

For these reasons I cannot sympathise in the fears which are 
sincerely felt at this moment by many honest and excellent persons. 
I believe that Ministers have acted honestly and wisely with 
respect to the Irish Church ; that their intentions to our own 
Church are friendly and favourable ; and that, as far as they have 
gone, they deserve the support of the public. I am, Sir, yours, &c, 

Sydney Smith, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 513 

354-] To Dr Holland. 

Combe Florey, June, 1835. 
My dear Holland, 

We shall have the greatest pleasure in receiving you and yours ; 
and if you were twice as numerous, it would be so much the better. 

What do you think of this last piece of legislation for boroughs ? 
It was necessary to do a good deal : the question is one of degree. 
I shall be in town on Tuesday, the 23d, and, I hope, under better 
auspices than last year. I have followed your directions, and 
therefore deserve a better fortune than fell to my lot on that 

occasion. is the Mahomet of rhubarb and magnesia, — the 

greatest medical impostor I know. 

I am suffering from my old complaint, the hay-fever (as it is 
called). My fear is, perishing by deliquescence ; I melt away in 
nasal and lachrymal profluvia. My remedies are warm pediluvium 
cathartics, topical application of a watery solution of opium to eyes, 
ears, and the interior of the nostrils. The membrane is so irritable, 
that light, dust, contradiction, an absurd remark, the sight of a 
Dissenter, — anything, sets me sneezing ; and if I begin sneezing at 
twelve, I don't leave oft" till two o'clock, and am heard distinctly in 
Taunton, when the wind sets that way, — a distance of six miles. 
Turn your mind to this little curse. If consumption is too powerful 
for physicians, at least they should not suffer themselves to be out- 
witted by such little upstart disorders as the hay-fever. 

I am very glad you married my daughter, for I am sure you are 
both very happy ; and I assure you I am proud of my son-in-law. 

I did not think , with all his nonsense, could have got down 

to tar-water. I have as much belief in it as I have in holy water ; 
it is the water has done the business, not the tar. They could not 
induce the sensual peer to drink water, but by mixing it with 
nonsense, and disguising the simplicity of the receipt. You must 
have a pitched battle with him about his tar- water, and teach him 
what he has never learnt, — the rudiments of common sense. 
Kindest love to dear Saba. Ever your affectionate father, 

Sydney Smith. 

355.] To Mrs Holland. 

Combe Florey, June 3, 1835. 
Dearest daughter, 
Sixty-four years old to-day. If H— — and F , in the estima- 
tion of the doctor, are better out of town, we shall be happy to 
receive them here before your rural holidays begin ; your children 
are my children. 
A fall of wood, greater than any of the other falls, has taken 

2 K 



5 H LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

place ; the little walnut-tree and the thorn removed, and a com- 
plete view up the valley, both from the library and drawing-room 
windows. Great opposition — the place would be entirely spoiled ; 
and twelve hours after, an admission of immense improvement. 
You have seen, my dear Saba, such things as these at Combe 
Florey. We are both well : no events. 

I am afraid of war ; I go at once into violent opposition to any 

Ministry who go to war. What a long line are the of needy and 

rapacious villains ! I thought old 's letter good and affecting. 

I have bought two more ponies, so we are strong in pigmy quad- 
rupeds : my three saddle-horses together cost me ^43, 10s., all 
perfect beauties, and warranted sound, wind and limb, and not a 
kick in them. Shall you ride when you come down ? We are 
never without fires. 

We are going through our usual course of jokes and dinners ; one 
advantage of the country is, that a joke once established is good for 
ever ; it is like the stuff which is denominated everlasting, and used 
as pantaloons by careful parents for their children. In London you 
expect a change of pleasantry ; but M. and N. laugh more at my six- 
years-old jokes than they did when the jokes were in their infancy. 

Sir Thomas spoke at for two hours, — the Jew for one hour ; 

the boys called out " Old clothes ! " as he came into the town, and 
offered to sell him sealing-wax and slippers. 

Give my kindest regards to your excellent husband, and believe 
me always, your affectionate father, Sydney Smith. 



356.] To Miss . 

London, July 22, 1835. 

Lucy, Lucy, my dear child, don't tear your frock : tearing frocks 
is not of itself a proof of genius ; but write as your mother writes, 
act as your mother acts ; be frank, loyal, affectionate, simple, honest; 
and then integrity or laceration of frock is of little import. 

And Lucy, dear child, mind your arithmetic. You know, in the 
first sum of yours I ever saw, there was a mistake. You had 
carried two (as a cab is licensed to do) and you ought, dear Lucy, 
to have carried but one. Is this a trifle ? What would life be 
without arithmetic, but a scene of horrors ? 

You are going to Boulogne, the city of debts, peopled by men 
who never understood arithmetic ; by the time you return, I shall 
probably have received my first paralytic stroke, and shall have 
lost all recollection of you ; therefore I now give you my parting 
advice. Don't marry anybody who has not a tolerable understand- 
ing and a thousand a year ; and God bless you, dear child ! 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 5*5 

357.] To R. Sharpe, Esq. 

Stratford Place, 1835. 
My dear Sharpe, 

It is impossible to say whether Caesar Sutton or Pompey Aber- 
cromby * will get the better ; a civil war is expected : on looking 
into my own mind, I find an utter inability of fighting for either 
party. 

is better, and having lost his disease, has also lost his topics 

of conversation ; has no heart to talk about, and is silent from want 
of suffering. 

I have seen the new House of Parliament : the House of Com- 
mons is very good, much better than the old one ; the Lords' house 
is shabby. Government are going on vigorously with the Church 
Bill ; it will be an infinitely more savage Bill than the Whigs would 
have ventured to introduce. The Whigs mean to start Abercromby 
against the Speaker. All the planets and comets mean to stop, 
and look on at the first meeting of Parliament. The Radicals allow 
260 to the Tories, who claim 290 : from 7 to 5 are given to the 
Stanley party. Read Inglis's Travels in Ireland. Bold, shrewd, 
and sensible, he is accused of judging more rapidly than any man 
in six weeks' time is entitled to do ; but then he merely states what 
he saw. I met him ; he seemed like his book. Young Mackintosh 
is going on with his father's Life. He sent me a tour on the Rhine, 
by his father ; but I thought it differed very little from other tours 
on the Rhine, and so I think he will not publish it. You will be glad 

to hear that is doing very well : he is civil to the counsel, does 

not interrupt, and converses with the other judges as if they had the 
elements of law and sense. India was offered to Sir James Kemp 
before it was offered to Lord Heytesbury ; Kemp refused it on 
account of a wound in his heel, a vulnerable point (as we know) in 
heroes. I hear a good account of your cough, and a bad one of 
your breathing ; pray take care of yourself. Rogers might be mis- 
taken for a wrestler at the Olympic games ; Luttrell is confined by 
the leg ; Whishaw is waiting to see which side he is to pooh-pooh ! 
I heartily wish, my dear Sharpe, that physicians may do you as 
much good as they have done me. Sydney Smith. 

You have met, I hear, with an agreeable clergyman ; the exist- 
ence of such a being has been hitherto denied by the naturalists ; 
measure him, and put down on paper what he eats. 

* In allusion to the contest about the Speaker. 



516 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

358.] To Sir Wilmot Horton, Bart. 

1835. 
Dear Horton, 

Why do you not come home, as was generally expected you 
would do ? Come soon ; life is short : Europe is better than Asia. 
The battle goes on between Democracy and Aristocracy ; I think 
it will end in a compromise, and that there will be nothing of a re- 
volutionary nature ; our quarrels, though important, are not serious 
enough for that. 

Read Mrs Butler's (Fanny Kemble's) Diary ; it is much better 
than the reviews and papers will allow it to be : what is called vul- 
garity, is useful and natural contempt for the exclusive and the 
superfine. Lord Grey has given up public life altogether, and is re- 
tired into the country. No book has appeared for a long time more 
agreeable than the Life of Mackintosh ; it is full of important judg- 
ments on important men, books, and things. 

I have seen Lord Clare : he hardly looks a shade more yellow. 
The men who have risen lately into more notice are Sir George 
Grey, Lord Grey's nephew, and Lord Howick ; Lord John and 
Morpeth have done very well ; Peel admirably. 

The complete has returned from Italy a greater bore than 

ever ; he bores on architecture, painting, statuary, and music. 
Frankland Lewis is filling his station of King of the Paupers 
extremely well : they have already worked wonders ; but of all 
occupations it must be the most disagreeable. I don't blame the 
object, but dislike the occupation ; the object is justified, because 
it prevents a much greater destruction of human beings hereafter. 

will get no credit for his book ; it is impossible now to be 

universal : men of the greatest information and accuracy swarm in 
the streets, — mineralogists, astronomers, ornithologists, and louso- 
logists ; the most minute blunder is immediately detected. Believe 
me, my dear Horton, yours sincerely, Sydney Smith. 



359.] To Mrs . 

Combe Florey, July, 1835. 

Many thanks, dear Mrs , for your kindness in thinking of 

me and my journey after the door was shut : but you have a good 
heart, and I hope it will be rewarded with that aliment in which the 
heart delights, — the respectful affection of the wise and just. 

I will write to you before I come to Boulogne, and am obliged to 
you for the commission. I have been travelling one hundred and 
fifty miles in my carriage, with a green parrot and the " Life of 
Mackintosh." I shall be much surprised if this book does not 
become extremely popular. It is full of profound and eloquent 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 517 

remarks on men, books, and events. What more, dear lady, can you 
wish for in a book ? 

I found here seven grandchildren, all in a dreadful state of per- 
spiration and screaming. You are in the agonies of change ; always 
some pain in leaving ! I could say a great deal on that subject, 
only I am afraid you would quiz me. And, pray, what am I to do 
for my evening-parties in November, if you are not in London ? 
Surely you must have overlooked this when you resolved to stay at 
Boulogne. 

Mr Whishaw is coming down here on the 8th of August, to stay 
some days. He is truly happy in the country. What a pleasure 
it would be if you were here to meet him ! But to get human 
beings together who ought to be together, is a dream. 

Keep a little corner in that fine heart of yours for me, however 
small it maybe ; a clergyman in your heart will keep all your other 
notions in good order. God bless you ! Sydney Smith. 



360.] To Mrs . 

August 28, 1835. 
Dear Mrs , 

Many thanks. The damsel will not take to the water, but we 
have found another in the house who has long been accustomed to 
the water, being no other than our laundry-maid. She had some 
little dread of a ship, but as I have assured her it is like a tub, she 
is comforted.* 

I think you will like Sir James Mackintosh's Life : it is full of 
his own thoughts upon men, books, and events, and I derived from 
it the greatest pleasure. He makes most honourable mention of 
your mother, whom I only know by one of her productions, — enough 
to secure my admiration. It is impossible to read Mill's violent 
attack upon Mackintosh without siding with the accused against 
the accuser. Can it be generally useful to speak with indecent con- 
tempt of a man whom so many men of sense admired, and who is 
no longer in the land of the living ? 

I should not scruple to draw upon your good-nature and kind- 
ness if I had any occasion to do so ; but as to my French journey, 
the only use you can be of to me is, to be as amiable and agreeable 
when I see you at Boulogne, as I have found you on this side the 
water. I can only say a few winged words, and leave you a flying 
benediction, as I am going by Rouen, and mean to see. a great deal 
in a little time. By the by, I want to find a good sleeping-place 
between Rouen and Paris, as I wish to arrive at Paris in the day, 
time enough to find good quarters. 

* Mrs Sydney's maid would not accompany her to France, from fear of the sea.- -Ed. 



5 1 3 LE TTERS OF THE RE V. S YDNE Y SMITH. 

We have had charming weather ; and all who come here, or have 
been here, have been delighted with our little paradise, — for such 
it really is | except that there is no serpent, and that we wear 

clothes. God bless you, dear Mrs ! My best and most 

friendly wishes attend you always. S. S. 



361.] To Mrs . 

Combe Florey, Sept. 7, 1835. 

Health to Mrs , and happiness, and agreeable society, care- 
lessness for the future, and enjoyment of the present ! 

Who can think of your offer now, and before, but with kindness 
and gratitude ? My brother, who loves paradoxes, says, if he saw 
a man walking into a pit, he would not advise him to turn the other 
way. My plan is, on the contrary, to advise, to interfere, to re- 
monstrate, at all hazards. I hate cold-blooded people, a tribe to 
which you have no relation; and the brother who talks this 
nonsense would not only stop the wanderer, but jump halfway 
down the pit to save him. We will go by the Lower Road. The 
consequence of all this beautiful weather will be, our liquefaction 
in our French expedition. 

I send you a list of all the papers written by me in the Edinburgh 
Review. Catch me, if you can, in any one illiberal sentiment, or 
in any opinion which I have need to recant ; and that, after twenty 
years' scribbling upon all subjects. 

Lord John Russel comes here next week with Lady John. He 
has behaved prudently, but the thing is not yet over. I am heartily 
glad of the prospect of agreement. Who, but the idiots of the 
earth, would fling a country like this into confusion, because a Bill 
(in its mutilated state a great improvement) is not carried as far, 
and does not embrace as much, as the best men could wish ? Is 
political happiness so cheap, and political improvement so easy, 
that the one can be sported with, and the other demanded, in this 

style ? God bless you, dear Mrs ! From your friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



362.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 11, 1835. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
Your letter gave me great pleasure, — the pleasure of being cared 
about by old and good friends, and the pleasure of seeing that they 
know I care about them. Lord Grey has met with that reception 
which every honest and right-minded man felt to be his due. If I 
had never known him, and lived in the North, I should have come 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 519 

out to wave my bonnet as he passed. He may depend upon it he 
has played a great part in English history, and that the best part 
of the English people entertain for him the most profound respect. 
And now, for the rest of life, let him trifle and lounge, and do 
everything which may be agreeable to him, and drink as much wine 
as he dare, and not be too severe in criticising himself. 

We have had Scarlett and Denman here : the former, an old 
friend of mine ; Denman everybody likes. 

I don't know whether you have the same joy, but I am heartily 
glad the fine weather is over ; it totally prevented me from taking 
exercise, and therefore, from being as well as I otherwise should 
have been. Lord and Lady John Russell came here on Monday. 
On the 22d I go to 25 Lower Brook Street, and on the 28th we go 
to Paris for a month, Mrs Sydney, and Mr and Mrs Hibbert, and 
myself. I have not the least wish to see Paris again, but go to 
show it to Mrs Sydney. I think every wife has a right to insist 
upon seeing Paris. It would give me some pleasure to talk with 
the King of Fiance for half an hour. 

We all (I take' it for granted) rejoice at the wise decision of the 
Government. They would have lost character if they had given 
up the Bill, and embroiled the country for an object so trifling. 
0'Connell ; s letter to the Duke of Wellington is dreadfully scur- 
rilous, but there are in it some distressing truths. The state of 
America will help the Tories, and diffuse a horror of mobs. 

I have (heat excepted) spent an agreeable summer with my two 
daughters and all their families, — seven grandchildren. It will 
give me great pleasure to hear that Lord Grey and you have been 
and are well and happy. SYDNEY SMITH. 



363.] To Lady Holland. 

Abbeville, Oct. 2, 1835. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
You, who are always good and kind to me, were so obliging as 
to say I might write to you, and inform you how we got over. 
Nothing could be worse. 

The weather has been horrible, the country is execrable, the travel- 
ling is very slow and tedious. To-morrow we go from this town to 
Rouen, and shall be in Paris on Wednesday. 

There is a family of English people living here who have been 
here for five years. They stopped to change horses, liked the 
place, and have been here ever since : father, mother, two hand- 
some daughters, and some young children. I should think it not 
unlikely that one of the daughters will make a nuptial alliance with 



520 LETTERS OE THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

the waiter, or give her hand to the son of the landlord, in order to 
pay the bill. 

I saw Sebastiani at Calais setting off with the dry-nurse of the 
Due de Nemours in a calhhe, which any of your Kensington 
tradesmen would have disdained to enter. There is a blessed 
contempt of appearances in France. 

We are well, and are going to sit down to a dinner at five francs 
a-head. AVe are going regularly through the Burgundy wines, — 
the most pernicious, and of course the best : Macon the first day, 
Chablis the second — both excellent ; to-day Volnay. S. S. 



364.] To Mrs Holland. 

Rotten, Oct. 6, 1835. 
My dearest Child, 

fell ill in London, and detained us a day or two. At Can- 
terbury, the wheel would not turn round ; we slept there, and lost 
our passage the next day at Dover : this was Wednesday, — a day 
of mist, fog, and despair. It blew a hurricane all that night, and 
we were kept awake by thinking of the different fish by which we 
should be devoured on the following day. I thought I should fall 
to the lot of some female porpoise, who, mistaking me for a porpoise, 
but finding me only a parson, would make a dinner of me. We were 
all up and at the quay by five in the morning. The captain hesi- 
tated very much whether he would embark, and your mother 
solicited me in pencil notes not to do so ; however, we embarked, — 
the French Ambassador, ourselves, twenty Calais shopkeepers, and 
a variety of all nations. The passage was tremendous : Hibbert 
had crossed four times, and the courier twenty ; I had crossed 
three times more, and we none of us ever remember such a passage. 
I lay along the deck, wrapped in a cloak, shut my eyes, and, as to 
danger, reflected that it was much more apparent than real ; and 
that, as I had so little life to lose, it was of little consequence 
whether I was drowned, or died, like a resident clergyman, from 
indigestion. Your mother was taken out more dead than alive. 

We were delighted with the hotel of Dessein, at Calais ; eggs, 
butter, bread, coffee — everything better than in England — the hotel 
itself magnificent. We all recovered, and stayed there the day ; and 
proceeded to sleep at Montreuil, forty miles, where we were still 
more improved by a good dinner. The next day, twenty miles 
farther, to Abbeville ; from thence, sixty miles the next day to this 
place, where we found a superb hotel, and are quite delighted with 
Rouen ; the churches far exceed anything in England in richness 
of architectural ornament. The old buildings of Rouen are most 
interesting. All that I refuse to see is, where particular things 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 521 

were done to particular persons ;— the square where Joan of Arc 
was burnt, — the house where Corneille was born. The events I 
admit to be important ; but, from long experience, I have found 
that the square where Joan of Arc was burnt, and the room where 
Corneille was born, have such a wonderful resemblance to other 
rooms and squares, that I have ceased to interest myself about 
them. 

To-morrow we start for Mantes, and the next day we shall be at 
Paris. Travelling is extremely slow — five miles an hour. I find 
the people now as I did before, most delightful ; compared to them 
we are perfect barbarians. Happy the man whose daughter were 
half as well-bred as the chambermaid at Dessein's, or whose sons 
were as polished as the waiter ! Whatever else you do, insist, when 
Holland brings you to France, on coming to Rouen ; there is no- 
thing in France more worth seeing. Come to Havre, and by steam 
to Rouen. God bless you, dear child ! Give my love to Froggy 
and Doggy. Your affectionate father, SYDNEY SMITH. 



365.] To Mrs . 

Hotel de Londres, Place Vendome, 
Sunday, Oct. 11, 1835. 
Dear Mrs , 

At Calais, we were delighted with Dessein's Hotel, and admired 
the waiter and chambermaid as two of the best-bred people we had 
ever seen. The next sensation was at Rouen. Nothing (as you 
know) can be finer ; — Beautiful country, ships, trees, churches, 
antiquities, commerce, — everything which makes life interesting 
and agreeable. I thank you for your advice, which sent me by the 
Lower Road to Paris. My general plan in life has been to avoid 
low roads, and to walk in high places, but from Rouen to Paris is 
an exception. 

The Ambassador lent us his box yesterday, and I heard Rubini 
and Grisi, Lablache and Tamburini. The opera, by Bellini, " I 
Puritani," was dreadfully tiresome and unintelligible in its plan. I 
hope it is the last opera I shall ever go to. 

We are well lodged in an hotel with a bad kitchen. I agree in 
the common praise of the French living. Light wines and meat 
thoroughly subdued by human skill, are more agreeable to me than 
the barbarian Stonehenge masses of meat with which we feed our- 
selves. Paris is very full. I look at it with some attention, as I 
am not sure I may not end my days in it. I suspect the fifth act 
of life should be in great cities ; it is there, in the long death of old 



522 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

age, that a man most forgets himself and his infirmities ; receives 
the greatest consolation from the attentions of friends, and the 
greatest diversion from external circumstances. 

Pray tell me how often the steam-boats go from Boulogne ; 
whether every day, or, if not, what days ; and when the tides will 
best serve, so as to go from harbour to harbour, in the week be- 
ginning the twenty-fifth of October. Pray excuse this trouble. I 
have always compunctions in asking you to do anything useful ; it 
is as if one were to use blonde lace for a napkin, or to drink toast 
and water out of a ruby cup ; — a clownish confusion of what is 
splendid and what is serviceable. Sincerely and respectfully yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



366. ' To the Countess Grey. 

Paris, Oct. 20, 1835. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I am sure the pleasantest thing that you and Lord Grey and 
Georgiana could do, would be to go to Paris for May and June. It 
would not cost more than life in London, and would be to you a 
soarce of infinite amusement and pleasing recollections. Our ex- 
cursion here has given Mrs Sydney the greatest gratification. We 
have seen the outside of Paris thoroughly. I think Lord and Lady 
Carlisle both improved in health ; they are to stay here the winter. 

I have seen Madame de once or twice, but I never attempt 

to speak to her, or to go within six yards of her. I am aware of her 
abilities, and of the charms of her conversation and manner to 
those whom it is worth her while to cultivate ; but to us others, she 
is, as it were, the Goddess Juno, or some near relation to Jove. 

The French are very ugly ; I have not seen one pretty French 

woman. I am a convert to the beauty of Lady ; her smile is 

charming. Paris swarms with English. Lord Granville was forced 
to go up five pair of stairs to find Lord Canterbury. In another 
garret, equally high, was lodged Lord Fitzgerald. I care very little 
about dinners ; but I acquiesce thoroughly in all that has been said 
of th eir science. I shall not easily forget a matelote at the Rochers 
de Cancale, an almond tart at Montreuil, or a fioulet a la Tartare 
at Grignon's. These are impressions which no changes in future 
life can obliterate. I am sure they would have sunk deeply into 
the mind of Lord Grey ; I know nobody more attentive to such 
matters. 

The King's best friends here hardly understand what he is at. I 
suppose he thinks that, with a free press, nothing could save 
France from anarchy : perhaps he may be right. I believe him to 
be a virtuous and excellent man. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 523 

We have had bad weather. We leave Paris to-morrow, and shall 
be in London on the 25th or 26th. Lord William Bentinck is in 
our hotel, endeavouring to patch up a constitution broken by 
every variety of climate. I find him a plain, unaffected, sensible 
man. 

Always, dear Lady Grey, with sincere respect and affection, 
yours, Sydney Smith. 

367.] To Mrs . 

Many thanks, dear Mrs , for the Review, which I conclude 

to be yours, and which I read with pleasure ; but I wish you great 
philosophers would condescend to tell us what and how much you 
propose to teach ; what the real advantages are which society is 
likely to reap from education, and whether the dangers which many 
apprehend are not imaginary. You take all the good for granted, 
and all the idea of evil as exploded. Whereas, education has 
many honest enemies ; and many honestly doubt and demur, who 
do not speak for fear of being assassinated by Benthamites, who 
might think it, upon the whole, more useful that such men should 
die than live. Sydney Smith. 

368.] To Lord Murray. 

Weymouth Street, Portland Place, Nov. 6, 1835. 

No news. All the Ministers meet here on the 12th. John 
Russell is to make a great splash at Bristol ; they began laying the 
cloth ten days ago. I was invited, but I have done with agitation. 
I see Lord John means to spare the House of Lords. 

Everybody here is delighted with Mackintosh's Life, and is calling 
out for more letters and diaries. I think Robert Mackintosh has 
done it very well, by putting in as little mortar as possible between 
the layers of stone. 

We are all pleased with our Paris excursion. The Liberals, 
particularly the Flahaults, do not know what to make of the last 
measures. If they had only been temporary, there would not have 
been a dissentient voice. S. S. 



369O 

November 23, 1835. 

My dear Philips, 

I have bought a house in Charles Street, Berkeley Square (lease 

for fourteen years), for ^1400, and £\o per annum ground-rent. 

It is near the chapel in John Street where I used to preach, I 

was tired of looking out for ready-furnished houses. We are five 



524 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

minutes from the Park, five minutes from you, and ten minutes 
from Dr Holland. 

All the Ministers are in town, and I meet them almost every day 
somewhere or another ; but hear nothing of importance, and have 
no wish to hear anything. They are going on with the reformation 
of the Church ; and the Ministers think that the members of the 
Commission put in by Peel are quite in earnest, and willing to do 
the thing fairly. 

In calling this morning, I met Lady Davy, Mrs Marcet, and Mrs 
Somerville in the same room. I told them I was the Shepherd 
Paris, and that I was to give an apple to the wisest. I congratulated 

Whishaw on coming out of W House unmarried. He says he 

does not know that he is unmarried, but rather thinks he is. Time 
will show if any one claims him. 

I ought to have the gout, having been in the free use of French 
wines ; and as Nature is never slow in paying these sort of debts, 
I suppose I shall have it. Sydney Smith. 



370.] To Mrs Holland. 

December 11, 1835. 
My dearest Child, 
Few are the adventures of a Canon travelling gently over good 
roads to his benefice. In my way to Reading I had, for my com- 
panion, the Mayor of Bristol when I preached that sermon in favour 
of the Catholics. He recognised me, and we did very well together. 
I was terribly afraid that he would stop at the same inn, and that 
I should have the delight of his society for the evening ; but he 
(thank God !) stopped at the Crown, as a loyal man, and I, as a 
rude one, went on to the Bear. Civil waiters, wax. candles, and off 

again the next morning, with my friend and Sir W. W , a very 

shrewd, clever, coarse, entertaining man, with whom I skirmished 
a Vaimable all the way to Bath. At Bath, candles still mor& waxen, 
and waiters still more profound. Being, since my travels, very 
much gallicised in my character, I ordered a pint of claret ; I found 
it incomparably the best wine I ever tasted ; it disappeared with a 
rapidity which surprises me even at this distance of time. The 
next morning, in the coach by eight, with a handsome valetu- 
dinarian lady, upon whom the coach produced the same effect as 
a steam-packet would do. I proposed weak warm brandy and 
water ; she thought, at first, it would produce inflammation of the 
stomach, but presently requested to have it warm and not weak, 
and she took it to the last drop, as I did the claret. All well here. 
God bless you, dearest child ! Love to Holland. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 525 

371.] To Sir Wilmot Horton, Bart. 

December, 1835. 
Dear Wilmot Horton, 

I have been to Paris with Mrs Sydney, and Mr and Mrs Hibbert. 
We saw all the cockney sights, and dined at all the usual restaur- 
ants, and vomited as usual into the channel which divides Albion 
from Gallia. Rivers are said to run blood after an engagement ; 
the Channel is discoloured, I am sure, in a less elegant and less 
pernicious way by English tourists going and coming. The King 
unpopular, beginning to do unwise things, which surprise the 
moderate Liberals ; but the predominant feeling in France is a 
love of quiet, and a horror of improvements. 

The manufactures of England are flourishing beyond example ; 
there is no other distress but agricultural distress. Every hour 
that the Ministers stay in they are increasing their strength by the 
patronage which falls in. I think they will last over next session, 
and beyond that it would be rash to venture a prediction. I agree 
with them in everything they are doing. I think there never was 
such an Administration in this country. This, you will say, is the 
language of a person (or parson) who wants a bishopric ; but, nolo 
episcopari. I dread the pomp, trifles, garments, and ruinous 
expense of the episcopal life ; and this is lucky, as I have not the 
smallest reason for believing that any one has the most remote 
intention of putting the mitre on my head. 

Our friend Frankland Lewis is gaining great and deserved 
reputation by his administration of the Poor Laws, — one of the 
best and boldest measures which ever emanated from any Govern- 
ment. 

I hope you have read Mackintosh's Life, and that you like it. I 
think it a delightful book, and such is the judgment of the public. 
Where are there more important opinions on men, books, and 
events ? They talk of a new edition, and another volume. 

holds out, but is all claret, gravy, and puff-paste. I don't 

think there is an ounce of flesh and blood in his composition. 
Adieu, dear Horton ! Come back. My love to my Lady. Ever 
yours, Sydney Smith. 

372.] To Lady Holland. 

January 1, 1836. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
I send this day my annual cheese, of which I pray your accept- 
ance. I hope it will prove as good as the last. 

The papers all say you are going out ; but I don't believe a word 
of it. I am very well and have no doubt you are so also \ for there 



526 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

is no disguising the fact, that you are really recovering your health. 
I denied it as long as I could, but it is too evident for discussion. 
There is no happiness in hard frost ; at present there is a thaw. . 

The purchase of the "Hole"* is nearly completed. I shall come 
up a few days before Mrs Sydney, to furnish it, and make it ready 
for her reception. This will probably be in February. I have 
fallen into the duet life, and it seems to do very well. Mrs Sydney 
and I have been reading Beauvilliers' book. on Cookery. I find, as 
I suspected, that garlic is power ; not in its despotic shape, but exer- 
cised with the greatest discretion. S. S. 



373.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Jamiary 6, 1836. 
My dear Murray, 

It seems a long while since we have heard anything about you 
and yours, in which matters we always take a very affectionate 
concern. I saw a good deal of the Ministers in the month of 
November, which I passed (as I always do pass it) in London. I 
see no reason why they should go out, and I do not in the least be- 
lieve they are going. I think they have done more for the country 
than all the Administrations since the Revolution. The Poor- 
Law Bill alone would immortalise them. It is working extremely 
well. 

I see you are destroying the Scotch Church. I think we are a 
little more popular in England than we were. Before I form any 
opinion on Establishments, I should like to know the effect they 
produce on vegetables. Many of our clergy suppose that if there 
was no Church of England, cucumbers and celery would not grow; 
that mustard and cress could not be raised. If Establishments are 
connected so much with the great laws of nature, this makes all the 
difference ; but I cannot believe it. 

God bless you, dear Murray ! Sydney Smith. 



374.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe Florey, Jan, 11, 1836. 
My dear Philips, 
I hope you have escaped gout this winter; it is in vain to 
hope you have not deserved it. I have had none, and deserve 
none. 

I have no doubt but that this Corporation Bill will produce excel- 
lent effects after the first year or two. The destruction of four or 
five hundred jobbing monopolies must carry with it very important 

* A house Mr Smith had purchased in Charles Street, Berkeley Square. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 527 

improvements. There are some excellent passages in O'Connell's 
last letter to Burdett, where he praises the justice and impartiality 
of this Government in the administration of Irish affairs. 

Whishaw retires from his office, and is to live between the two 
Romillys, or, as they call them, Romulus and Remus ; I am sin- 
cerely glad of this arrangement. I sent you yesterday, through 
George, a printed list of my articles in the Edinburgh Review; they 
may make you laugh on a rainy day. 

The bargain for my house is nearly finished. The lawyers dis- 
covered some flaw in the title about the time of the Norman Con- 
quest ; but, thinking the parties must have disappeared in the 
quarrels of York and Lancaster, I waived the objection. Not hav- 
ing your cheerfulness, the country emiuies me at this season of the 
year ; and I have a large house and no children in it. I have not 
the slightest belief in the going out of the Ministry ; I should as 
soon think of Drummond's white light going out. 

W left behind him ^100,000, with the following laconic 

account how he had acquired it by different diseases : — " Aurum 
catharticum, ,£20,000 ; aurum diureticum, ,£10,000 ; aurum poda- 
grosum, ^30,000 ; aurum apoplecticum, ,£20,000 ; aurum senile 
et nervorum, £ 10,000. " But for the truth of this anecdote I 
vouch not. 

I think we must adopt a daughter. Sydney Smith. 



375.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Feb. 1, 1836. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I write a line to say that my tributary cheese is only waiting in 
Somersetshire, because you are waiting in Northumberland ; and it 
will come to town to be eaten, as soon as it is aware that you are 
there to eat it. I hope that Lord Grey and you are well ; no easy 
thing, seeing that there are about fifteen hundred diseases to which 
man is subject. 

Without having thought much about them (and, as I have no part 
to play, I am not bound to think about them), I like all the Whigs 
have done. I only wish them to bear in mind, that the conse- 
quences of giving so much power to the people have not yet been 
tried at a period of bad harvest and checked manufactures. The 
prosperity of the country during all these changes has been with- 
out example. 

Mrs Sydney' and I have been leading a Darby-and-Joan life for 
these last two months, without children. This kind of life might 
have done very well for Adam and Eve in Paradise, where the 



528 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

weather was fine, and the beasts as numerous as in the Zoological 
Gardens, and the plants equal to anything in the gardens about 
London ; but I like a greater variety. 

Mackintosh kept all his letters. He had a bundle of mine, which 
his son returned to me. I found a letter written thirty-five years 
ago, giving an account of my first introduction to Lord and Lady 
Holland. I sent it to Lady Holland, who was much amused by it. 
Your grateful and affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 

PS. — I had no idea that, in offering my humble caseous tribute 
every year, I should minister in so great a degree to my own glory. 
I bought the other day some Cheshire cheese at Cullam's, in Bond 
Street, desiring him to send it to Mr Sydney Smith's. He smiled, 
and said, " Sir, your name is very familiar to me." " No," I replied, 
" Mr Cullam, I am not Sir Sydney Smith, but Mr Sydney Smith." 
" I am perfectly aware of it," he said ; " I know whom I am address- 
ing ; I have often heard of the cheeses you send to Lord Grey." 
So you see there is no escaping from fame. 



376.] To Sir Wilmot Horton, Bart. 

Combe Florey, Feb. 8, 1836. 
Dear Wilmot Horton, 

I agree with the Whigs in all they are doing, and have only tha* 
mistrust which belongs to the subject of politics, and is inseparable 
from it. I see no probability of the Tories returning for any time 
to power. Public opinion is increasing in favour of the Whigs, 
who are, in my opinion, acting wisely, though boldly ; nor do I see 
any great mistake they have committed. 

I have bought a small house in Charles Street, Berkeley Square, 
—tired of taking a furnished house every year. I am going slowly 
down the hill of life. One evil in old age is, that as your time is 
come, you think every little illness is the beginning of the end. 
W T hen a man expects to be arrested, every knock at the door is an 
alarm. 

The welfare of the country is unexampled. Politicians should 
not forget that they have never tried the chances of bad harvests 
with checked manufactures. 

Tufnell is become a great man, loaded with places and honours. 
Hay is in rather an awkward position, — a Tory in the midst of 
Whigs. I see him from time to time, and always like his society. 
I hear you have banished yourself till the year 1840. You will find 
me at that period at St Paul's, against the wall. 

I think the Whigs have sent a good and safe man to . The 

only objection to him is, he looks so confoundedly melancholy, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 539 

that in any public calamity, he will scatter despair and impede the 
active virtues. I shall be very glad to see you and yours. 

Sydney Smith. 



377.] To Sir George Philips. 

February 28, 1836. 
My dear Philips, 

You say I have many comic ideas rising in my mind ; this may 
be true ; but the champagne bottle is no better for holding the 
champagne. Don't you remember the old story of Carlin, the 
French harlequin ? It settles these questions. I don't mean to 
say I am prone to melancholy ; but I acknowledge my weakness 
enough to confess that I want the aid of society, and dislike a 
solitary life. 

Thomas Brown was an intimate friend of mine, and used to dine 
with me regularly every Sunday in Edinburgh. He was a Lake 
poet, a profound metaphysician, and one of the most virtuous men 
that ever lived. As a metaphysician, Dugald Stewart was a hum- 
bug to him. Brown had real talents for the thing. You must 
recognise, in reading Brown, many of those arguments with which 
I have so often reduced you to silence in metaphysical discussions. 
Your discovery of Brown is amusing. Go on ! You will detect 
Dryden if you persevere ; bring to light John Milton, and drag 
William Shakspeare from his ill-deserved obscurity ! 

The Whigs seem to me stronger than ever ; I agree in all their 
measures. I have no doubt about Irish Municipalities. 

Sydney Smith. 



378.] To Mrs Murchison. 

No date. 
Dear Madam, 

I am not formally, but really obliged to you for this sketch of 
Grattan. It is so well expressed, that I suspect it to be your own. 

Mrs Sydney is very unwell ; and I am at St Paul's, going and 
coming, all the morning. As soon as I am free, and she is well, 
we will leave our cards at your door, if you will not let us in. I 
say cards, but / shall leave a specimen, — strontian, or greywacke, 
or something indicative of my respect for Geology and you. 
Very truly yours, Sydney Smith. 

379.] To Mrs . 

July, 1836. 

Dear Mrs , 

I shall have great pleasure in calling for you to go to Mrs 

2 L 



530 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Charles Buller, on Wednesday. Mrs Sydney's arm is rather better ; 
many thanks for the inquiry. 

Very high and very low temperature extinguishes all human 
sympathy and relations. It is impossible to feel affection beyond 
78 , or below 20 of Fahrenheit ; human nature is too solid or too 
liquid beyond these limits. Man only lives to shiver or to perspire. 
God send that the glass may fall, and restore me to my regard for 
you A which in the temperate zone is invariable. 

Sydney Smith. 



380.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe Florey, July 30, 1836. 
My dear Philips, 

I had always heard that Buxton was the worst place in the world 
for gouty people, and I think it has proved itself so in your instance. 
What you call throwing out the gout, is all nonsense. You had the 
gout a little ; after a certain time it would have disappeared ; but 

you go to Buxton, it becomes worse, and then you and Dr 

say, unphilosophically, that the gout was in you before, and has 

been thrown out. I should think better of Dr if he had not 

been discovered by . The land he discovers is very apt to be 

a fog-bank. 

I have been, as you see, fighting with bishops at Ephesus. We 
have procured a suspension of the Bill ; but the Whigs have com- 
mitted so great an error, in their subserviency to bishops, that I 
am afraid they must persevere. The lower clergy have been 
scandalously neglected by the Whig Government. But enough of 
this nonsense. I think the Administration will have a good 
majority on the Appropriation Clause, and J see no prospect of a 
change. 

We stayed at Windsor a day. All that is worth seeing is seen 
in an hour : the outside of the Castle, — the view from the terrace, 
— and two or three state-rooms. We were unlucky enough to have 
particular introductions, and suffered as is usual on such occasions. 

We are expecting some company, but the idea of filling a country- 
house with pleasant people is a dream ; it all ends in excuses and 
disappointments, and nobody comes but the parson of the parish. 
It will give us great pleasure, my dear Philips, to hear you are 
better. Pray say it as soon as you can say so, and in the mean- 
time believe me, with sincere affection, yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 531 

381.3 To Mrs . 

Combe Florey, Taunton, Sept. 15, 1836. 

My dear Mrs , 

I am afraid of delaying a day for fear you should be gone. I 
cannot imitate the lofty flights of Jeffrey, but I am, without meta- 
phors, very sorry to lose the pleasures of your society. 

We have a pleasant party staying here. I will write to you if I 
remain alive. If I am removed (as is the common fate of Canons) 
by an indigestion, retain some good-natured recollections of an 
ecclesiastic who knows your value. God bless you ! 

Sydney Smith. 



3 82. J To Sir W. Horton, Bart. 

Combe Florey, Sept., 1836. 
My dear Wilmot Horton, 
The same balance of parties remains, with a slight preponder- 
ance to the popular side. Peel plays his game with consummate 
skill and prudence, and I am inclined to say the same of Lord 
Lyndhurst and the House of Lords. The effect of their different 
measures upon the opinions of the country cannot be well mea- 
sured, because the prosperity is so great that everybody is satisfied 
with almost any measure and any government. In the meantime 
the Whigs are carrying many measures, any one of which in the 
old system of things would have immortalised any Administration. 
Think of Tithes, Poor Law, and the Slave Trade : did you ever 
hope to see such things accomplished ? ' John Russell, Sir George 
Grey, and Ho wick are the persons who have most risen in the 
world. I shall be very glad to see you and Lady Wilmot again in 
'38. I keep my health, and will try to keep it. Remember me, 
and let us meet as old friends when you return. 

Sydney Smith. 



383.] To Lady Ashburton. 

My dear Lady Ashburton, 
On one day of the year, the Canons of St Paul's divide a little 
money — an inadequate recompense for all the troubles and anxieties 
they undergo. This day is, unfortunately for me, that on which 
you have asked me (the 25th of March), when we all dine together, 
endeavouring to forget for a few moments, by the aid of meat and 
wine, the sorrows and persecutions of the Church. I am sure Lord 
Ashburton and yourself, and your son Francis, feel for us as you 
ought to do. Ever yours, Sydney Smith. 



532 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

3 84. J To Lady Ashburton. 

[With a Print.] 
Dear Lady Ashburton, 
Miss Mildmay told me yesterday that you had been looking 
about for a print of the Rev. Sydney Smith. Here he is, — pray 
accept him. I said to the artist, " Whatever you do, preserve the 
orthodox look." Ever truly yours, Sydney Smith. 



385.] To Colonel Fox. 

October, 1836. 
My dear Charles, 
If you have ever paid any attention to the habits of animals, you 
will know that donkeys are remarkably cunning in opening gates. 
The way to stop them is to have two latches instead of one : a 
human being has two hands, and lifts up both latches at once : a 
donkey has only one nose, and latch a drops, as he quits it to lift 
up latch b. Bobus and I had the grand luck to see little Aunty 
engaged intensely with this problem. She was taking a walk, and 
was arrested by a gate with this formidable difficulty : the donkeys 
were looking on to await the issue. Aunty lifted up the first latch 
with the most perfect success, but found herself opposed by a 
second ; flushed with victory, she quitted the first latch and rushed 
at the second : her success was equal, till in the meantime the first 
dropped. She tried this two or three times, and, to her utter 
astonishment, with the same results ; the donkeys brayed, and 
Aunty was walking away in great dejection, till Bobus and I re- 
called her with loud laughter, showed her that she had two hands, 
and roused her to vindicate her superiority over the donkeys. I 
mention this to you to request that you will make no allusion to 
this animal, as she is remarkably touchy on the subject, and also 
that you will not mention it to Lady Mary. I wish you would both 
come here next year. Always yours, my dear Charles, very sincerely, 
Sydney Smith. 

386.] To Lady Ashburton. 

33 Charles Street, Nov. 10, 1836. 
Health to you, my dear Lady Ashburton ! May your daughters 
marry the wise and the good ! And may your sons support our 
admirable Constitution in Church and State ! May Lord Ash- 
burton use in future steady horses and skilful coachmen ; and may 

the friendship between you and Lady flame over the moral 

world, and shame, by its steady light, the fleeting and flickering 
passions of the human race 1 



\ 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 533 

] must stay here all this month, or, at least, till the 29th, or the 
week after ; and which of these two weeks, I will let you know in 
two or three days. As to parties, I am the most comfortable guest 
in the world. I have not the slightest objection to meet everybody, 
nor the slightest wish to see anybody except you and yours. 

Mr and Mrs dined at yesterday. I sat next to Mr 

. His voice faltered, and he looked pale : I did all I could to 

encourage him ; made him take quantities of sherry. Mrs 

also looked very unhappy, and I had no doubt took the H. H. 
draught when she went home. You know, perhaps, that there is a 
particular draught which the London apothecaries give to persons 
who have been frightened at H. H. They will both tell you that 
they were not at all frightened, but don't believe them ; I have seen 
so much of the disorder, that I am never mistaken. However, 
don't let me make you uneasy ; it generally goes off after a day or 
two, and rarely does any permanent injury to the constitution. 
Ever yours very truly, Sydney Smith. 

387.] To John Murray, Esq. 

33 Charles Street, Nov. 25, 1836. 
My dear Murray, 

I leave London on the 1st of December for Combe Florey, and 
should have done so before, but we, the Cathedrals, are fighting 
the Bishops ; and as I am ringleader, I have been forced to remain. 
I observe with pleasure the rising spirit of the Cathedrals, which 
have been abominably ill-used. 

I see nothing as yet which is to disturb the Whigs. Public 
opinion is decidedly in their favour. The only two faults they have 
committed are, meddling too much in the private concerns of other 
nations, and John Russell's passion for Bishops. 

It is, I believe, settled that Parliament is to meet very early this 
year, — I should say, the middle of January, — a very wise measure, 
if it abridge the duration of the summer session ; but the question 
is, if they will not go on legislating till stinks and sunbeams drive 
them out of London. Sydney Smith. 

388.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe Florey, Dec. 22, 1836. 
Dear Sir George, 
I stayed a day or two at Lord Ashburton's in my way down. To 
be in a Tory house is like being in another planet. I don't believe 
a word about the Whigs going out ; why should they ? 

Give my love to Julia. The weather is beautiful ; but, as Noodle 
says (with his eyes beaming with delight), " We shall suffer for this, 



534 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

Sir, by and by." We are going on with our war against the 
Bishops, and I shall write a pamphlet upon it, which neither you 
nor George will read, but Julia will, I think ; I should like to 
reason the matter with her. 

I have read " Astoria" with great pleasure ; it is a book to put in 
your library, as an entertaining, well written — very well written— 
account of savage life, on a most extensive scale. Ellice, who has 
just come from America, says Mr Astor is worth ^5,000,000 
sterling ; but Baring does not believe it, or is jealous perhaps. 

I have had no gout, nor any symptom of it ; by eating little, and 
drinking only water, I keep body and mind in a serene state, and 
spare the great toe. Looking back at my past life, I find that all 
my miseries of body and mind have proceeded from indigestion. 
Young people in early life should be thoroughly taught the moral, 
intellectual, and physical evils of indigestion. Love to all. God 
bless you I Sydney Smith. 

389.] From the Right Hon. Thomas Grenville. 

Cleveland Square, Jan. 14, 1837. 
My dear Sir, 
The letter to Archdeacon Singleton, for which I have to thank the 
author, did not require the printed name upon the title-page. The 
lively talent, sound argument, and genuine humour of the fifty 
pages which have so much interested me, could have been derived 
from no pen but one. You have cut it somewhat sharply, but, I 
believe, not more so than was requisite to give it any useful effect. 
I am sanguine enough to hope good from it, though I am surprised 
at myself for any such feelings in times which seem to suggest fear 
only. Ever, my dear Sir, in times good or bad, very truly yours, 

Thomas Grenville. 



390.] From the late Archdeacon Singleton. 

Alnwick Castle, Feb. 3, 1837. 
My dear Sir, 
You may suppose that I have long since read your letter with 
the greatest interest and admiration : but I would not write to you 
till I could learn how it would make its way with such persons and 
parties as came under my cognizance. The result of my inquiries 
has been most satisfactory. It sells in country book-shops, where 
the question was never known or considered, till you gave life and 
spirit, as well as argument, to the discussion. High Tories indeed 
regret the exposure of the Bishops, but in the same breath admit 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 535 

the justice and necessity of it ; whilst the Whigs, being now com- 
pelled to repudiate the errors of the Commission, have left it 
powerless, and, if we believe the "Times," almost a "caput 
mortuum" 

That a serious impression has been made there can be no doubt ; 
and forgive me if I say that you, who have done so much, may yet 
do more. Could you not see Lord privately and in con- 
fidence, before the 16th of February (for which day notice for his 
motion on this subject has been given), and urge upon him such 
an alteration and increase of the Commission, as, in the spirit of 
justice and impartiality, may effect such a reform as will propitiate 
the public without violating the honest feelings, and much less the 
oaths and consciences, of the clergy? There never has been and 
there never will be again, so fair and fit an opportunity for practical 
amendment. The profession is ready and expectant. The public, 
calm, and perhaps indifferent. There is neither impatience within, 
nor pressure from without. If this opportunity of correcting abuses 
and modifying anomalies be now lost, it will occur no more in our 
generation. 

Frankly, it seems to me that yott have a chance of more 
effectually serving and saving the Church of England than any 
individual has ever enjoyed. I remain, my dear Sir, ever yours, 
with esteem and regard, Th. S. Singleton. 



391.] To Lord John Russell. 

April % 1837. 
My dear John, 

At eleven o'clock in the morning, some years ago, the Archbishop 
of Canterbury called upon a friend of mine (my informant) and 
said, " I am going to the King (George III.) to meet Perceval, who 
wants to make Mansell Bishop of Bristol. I have advised the 
King not to assent to it, and he is thoroughly determined it shall 
not be. I will call in an hour or two, and tell you what has passed." 
Canterbury did not return till eleven at night. " Quite in vain," 
he said ; " Perceval has beaten us all ; he tendered his immediate 
resignation. ' If he were not considered to be a fit person for 
recommending the dignitaries of the Church, he was not a fit 
person to be at the head of the Treasury.' After a conflict carried 
on all day, we were forced to yield." 

Such a conflict, carried on once, and ending with victory, never 
need be repeated. 

I know not, by alluding to the chess-board, whether you mean 

the charges which might make against me, or against liberal 

men in general. I defy to quote a single passage of my writ- 



536 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

ing contrary to the doctrines of the Church of England ; for I have 
always avoided speculative, and preached practical, religion. I 
defy him to mention a single action in my life which he can call 
immoral. The only thing he could charge me with, would be high 
spirits, and much innocent nonsense. I am distinguished as a 
preacher, and sedulous as a parochial clergyman. His real charge 
is, that I am a high-spirited, honest, uncompromising man, whom 
all the bench of Bishops could not turn, and who would set them 
all at defiance upon great and vital questions. This is the reason 
why (as far as depends upon others) I am not a bishop ; but I am 
thoroughly sincere in saying I would not take any bishopric what- 
ever, and to this I pledge my honour and character as a gentleman. 
But, had I been a bishop, you w-ould have seen me, on a late 

occasion, charging and with a gallantry which would 

have warmed your heart's blood, and made Melbourne rub the skin 
off his hands. 

Pretended heterodoxy is the plea with which the Bishops en- 
deavoured to keep off the bench every man of spirit and independ- 
ence, and to terrify you into the appointment of feeble men, who will 
be sure to desert you (as all your bishops have lately and shame- 
fully done) in a moment of peril. When was there greater clamour 

excited than by the appointment of , or when were there 

stronger charges of heterodoxy ? Lord Grey disregarded all this, 

and they are forgotten Believe me to be, dear John, 

sincerely yours, Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — Make Edward Stanley and Caldwell, a friend of Lord 
Lansdowne's and mine, bishops ; both unexceptionable men. 



392.] To Master Humphrey Mildmay. 

April io t 1837. 

I am very sorry to hear you have been so ill. I have inquired 
about you every day, till I heard you were better. Mr Travers is a 
very skilful surgeon, and I have no doubt you will soon be well. In 
the Trojan War, the Greek surgeons used cheese and wine for their 
ointments, and in Henry the Eighth's time cobbler's wax and rust of 
iron were the ingredients ; so, you see, it is some advantage to live 
in Berkeley Square, in the year 1837. 

I am going to Holland, and I will write to you from thence to 
tell you all I have seen, and you will take care to read my letter to 
Mr Travers. In the meantime, my dear little Humphrey, I wish 
you most heartily 3. speedy recovery, and God bless you ! 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 537 

393.] To the Countess Grey. 

The Hague, Friday, May 12, 1837. 

Dear Lady Grey, 

Never come into Holland. If Lord Grey solicits you to do so, 

let him solicit in vain. The roads all paved — inns dirty, and dearer 

than the dearest in England — country frightful beyond all belief; 

no trees but willows— no fuel but turf ; all the people uglier than 

I have had a slight fit of the gout, a warning which shall bring 
me back sooner than I intended ; because it is a question put to me 
by my constitution, "What business has such an ancient gentleman 
as you to be making tours, and to be putting yourself out of your 
ordinary method of living?" I have patched myself up for the 
present, and am going to-morrow to Amsterdam ; I hope to be at 
Brussels on my way back (either home or to the Rhine, as I feel 
myself) on Wednesday, the 17th. I find about one quarter of the 
things worth seeing which are said to be so. For instance, at the 
Hague (whence I write) there is nothing which need detain an 
Englishman (who has seen everything in his own country) three 
hours, and I was advised to stay there three days. The best thing 
in Holland is the bread — the worst thing the water. A Dutch 
baker {brood-bakker) would make his fortune in London. 

Madame Falk has lately had a paralytic stroke, but is recovered. 
Falk is ill, I believe, with the gout, and could not see me. 

My journey will confirm me in the immense superiority of Eng- 
land over the rest of the world ; and Lord Grey and you are the 
best people in it, and I have a great affection for you both. 

S. S. 

394.] To Sir George Philips. 

Brussels, May 20, 1837. 
My dear Philips, 

A detestable country all the way from Calais to Amsterdam. 
Fine cities — admirable architects, far exceeding us, both in their old 
and new buildings — good bakers — very ugly — stink of tobacco — 
horses all fat — soldiers little — inns dirty, and very expensive ; — 
better modern painters than we are. 

I went to the Belgic Parliament. There was a pound short in 
the public accounts, and they were speaking about it Our friend 
Van de Weyer has been very hospitable and civil to us. He sails 
for England to-day, and there is no idea of his taking office. He 
prefers the English embassy to any other situation, and I am very 
glad of it. I like his mother, — a very good-hearted, amiable old 
lady. 



53 S LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

The finest city I have seen is Amsterdam ; I was much struck 
with its commercial grandeur. The only city I could live in, of all 
I have seen, is the city of Brussels. All the great cities of Flanders 
are under-peopled. 

We dined yesterday with Sir Hamilton Seymour ; a dinner which 
consisted of all the accidental arrivals at Brussels, and went off well 
enough. He seems good-natured and obliging, and the female 
ambassador is pretty. Sydney Smith. 

395.] To Mrs Murchison. 

June 8, 1837. 

Engaged, my dear Madam, to Sir George Philips, or should have 
been too happy ; will come in the evening, if possible. 

I am surprised that an archbishop, living in an alluvial country, 
should be at your table. Are there no bishops among the Silurian 
rocks ? Ever yours, Sydney Smith. 

396.] To Miss Berry. 

Combe Florey, July 31, 1837. 

Are you well ? that is the great point. When do you mean to 
come and pay us a visit ? The general rumour of the times is, that 
you are tired to death of the country, and that nothing will ever 
induce you to try it again ; that you bought a rake, and attempted 
to rake the flower-beds, and did it so badly that you pulled up all 
the flowers. It is impossible, as they say also, to get into the 
Lindsay the smallest acquaintance with the vegetable world ; and 
that, if it were not for the interference of friends, she would order 
the roses to be boiled for dinner, and gather a cauliflower as a 
nosegay. 

Your friends the John Russells and Labouchere are here, talking 
of the sweet and sacred cause of liberty. I am getting innocent as 
fast as I can, and have already begun to dose my parishioners, 
which, as I do not shoot or hunt, is my only rural amusement. 

Seriously speaking, my dear Miss Berry, you and Agnes and the 
Lindsay owe us a visit, and in your heart you cannot deny it 
Remember me to Gulielma, your neighbour. Accept my benedic- 
tion and affection. Sydney Smith. 

397.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe Florey, Aug. 15, 1837. 
My dear Lady Holland, 
The sacred cause of sweet liberty has suffered grievously here. 
There is a tremendous reaction. All our Whig candidates are dis- 
graced, and despotism is the order of the day. Do you think the 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 539 

Whigs will go on ? The country is really in a worse state than 
before, because parties are still more finely balanced than before 
the dissolution. The topics urged against the Ministry (most 
foolishly and unjustly, but successfully) are O'Connell, the Church, 
and Poor Laws. Why don't you get some of your friends to put 
out a splendid and slashing defence ? 

I hope you and Lord Holland are in fair preservation. Lord 
and Lady John Russell were here, with a beautiful and well-discip- 
lined child. The children of people of rank are generally much 
better behaved than other children. The parents of the former do 
not excel the parents of the latter in the same proportion, if they 
excel them at all. 

Among our guests was Senior of Kensington, whose conversation 
is always agreeable to me. He is fond of reasoning on important 
subjects, and reasons calmly, clearly, and convincingly. 

We expect Saba and Dr Holland the end of this or the begin- 
ning of next month. I am in great hopes we shall have some cases ; 
I am keeping three or four simmering for him. It is enough to break 
one's heart to see him in the country ; and that I should be his com- 
forter in such a calamity is droll enough ! Yours, dear Lady Hol- 
land, very affectionately, Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — I am delighted that you like my pamphlet ; I tried all I 
could not to write it, but John Russell would make me do so, by 
refusing the fair terms I offered. 



398.] To Arthur Kinglake, Esq. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 30, 1837. 
Dear Sir, 
I am much obliged by the present of your brother's book. I am 
convinced digestion is the great secret of life ; and that character, 
talents, virtues, and qualities are powerfully affected by beef, mutton, 
pie-crust, and rich soups. I have often thought I could feed or starve 
men into many virtues and vices, and affect them more powerfully 
with my instruments of cookery than Timotheus could do for- 
merly with his lyre. Ever yours very truly, Sydney Smith. 



399.] To Mrs . 

November 9, 1837. 
Ah, dear Lady ! is it you ? Do I see again your handwriting ? 
and when shall I see yourself? (as the Irish say). You may de- 
pend upon it, all lives out of London are mistakes, more or less 
grievous; — but mistakes. 



S40 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

I am alone in London, without Mrs Smith, upon duty at St Paul's. 
London, however, is full, from one of these eternal dissolutions and 
re-assemblage of Parliaments, with which these latter days have 
abounded. I wish you were back again : nobody is so agreeable, 
so frank, so loyal, so good-hearted. I do not think I have made 
any new female friends since I saw you, but have been faithful to 
you. But I love excellence of all kinds, and seek and cherish it. 

The Whigs will remain in ; they are in no present danger. Did you 
read my pamphlet against the Bishops, and how did you like it ? 

I have not seen your friend Jeffrey for these two years. He did 
not come to town last year. I hear with the greatest pleasure of 
his fame as a judge. 

I am going back to Combe Florey the end of the month, to re- 
main till the beginning of March ; and then in London for some 
months, where I sincerely hope to see you. To see you again will 
be like the resurrection of flowers in the spring ; the bitterness of 

solitude, I shall say, is past. God bless you, dear Mrs ! 

Sydney Smith. 



400.] To his Excellency M. Van de Weyer. 

33 Ckar/es Street, Nov. 27, 1837. 
My dear Sir, 
The evils of Combe Florey are its distance (150 miles), the 
badness of the season, the dulness and stupidity of a country par- 
sonage in the winter. The goods of Combe Florey are, that our 
house is very warm and comfortable, and that Mr and Mrs Hibbert 
will be there on the 15th of December; that you can go nowhere 
where you are more valued, and that we shall be heartily glad to 
see you. Now take your choice, and tell me what your choice is ; 
and let me know what I owe you for some charming wine ; and 
believe me, yours sincerely, Sydney Smith. 



4.01.I To the Countess Grey. 

1838. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

I suppose you do not mean to be in town till after Easter. I 
shall be there the middle of next month. I was in town all Nov- 
ember. The general notion was, that the Whigs were weakened ; 
at the same time it is not easy to see how the ill temper of the 
Radicals will get them out. The Radicals will never dare to vote 
with the Tories, and on all Radical questions the Tories will vote 
with the Government. I see, by the report of the Church Com- 
missioners for November last, that all the points for which the 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMI TIL 541 

Cathedrals contended are given up. This is very handsome on the 
part of the Commissioners ; and their reform, whether wise or not, 
will at least be just. 

I hope Lord Grey continues quite well ; but quite well, I find, at 
sixty-seven, means about twelve or fourteen distinct ailments ; 
weak eyes, a violent pain in the ankle, stomach slightly disor- 
dered, &c. 

I have had a long correspondence with Lord John Russell about 
shutting St Paul's, which I have published, and would send you if 
it were a subject of any interest. Joseph Hume wants to make 
himself popular with the Middlesex electors ; Lord John is afraid 
of Joseph Hume : hence all the correspondence. 

I send you a list of my Papers in the Edinburgh Review. If 
you keep that journal, some of them may amuse you when you are 
out of spirits. Ever affectionately yours, S. S. 



402.] TO R. MONCKTON MlLNES, ESQ. 

Juneio, 1838. 
My dear Sir, 

If you want to get a place for a relation, you must not delay it 
till he is born, but make an application for him in utero, about the 
fifth or sixth month. The same with any smaller accommodation. 

You ask for tickets on Wednesday, to go to St Paul's on Thurs- 
day, my first promise dating 1836! I would however have done 
my possible, but your letter did not arrive till Saturday {paulo post). 
The fact is, I have been wandering about the coast, for Mrs Syd- 
ney's health ; and am taken by the Preventive Service for a brandy 
merchant, waiting an opportunity of running goods on a large 
scale. 

I wish you many long and hot dinners with lords and ladies, 
wits and poets ; and am always truly yours, Sydney Smith. 



403.] To Lady Davy. 

July 7 , 1838. 
Dear Lady Davy, 

Common-place, delivered in a boisterous manner, three miles 
off; and bad, tedious music. If you choose to expose yourself 
to this in cold blood, it becomes my duty to afford you the means of 
doing so ; for which purpose I enclose, with my affectionate bene- 
diction, the order to the " virgins." 

Pray excuse me from dining just now. I am possessed by a 
legion of devils. Accustomed to a hot climate, they are very active 
in warm weather. Ever yours, Sydney Smith, 



542 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

404.] To Miss G. Harcourt. 

Charles Street , 1838. 
My dear Georgian*, 

You see how desirous I am to do what you bid me. In general, 
nothing is so foolish as to recommend a medicine. If I am doing 
a foolish thing, you are not the first young lady who has driven 
an old gentleman to this line of action. 

That loose and disorderly young man, E H , has mis- 
taken my wishes for my powers, and has told you that I proposed 
to do, what I only said I should be most happy to do. I have 
overstayed my time so much here, that I must hasten home, 
and feed my starving flock. I should have left London before, but 
how could I do so, in the pains and perils of the Church, which I 
have been defending at all moral hazards ? Young tells me that 
nothing will induce the Archbishop to read my pamphlets, or to 
allow you to read them. 

The summer and the country, dear Georgiana, have no charms 
for me. I look forward anxiously to the return of bad weather, 
coal fires, and good society in a crowded city. I have no relish for 
the country ; it is a kind of healthy grave. I am afraid you are not 
exempt from the delusions of flowers, green turf, and birds ; they 
all afford slight gratification, but not worth an hour of rational con- 
versation ; and rational conversation in sufficient quantities is only 
to be had from the congregation of a million of people in one spot. 
God bless you ! Sydney Smith. 



405.] To Sir George Philips. 

About September, 1838. 
My dear Philips, 

You will be glad to hear that I have had a fit of the gout, but I 
cannot flatter you with its being anything very considerable. The 
Miss Berrys and Lady Charlotte Lindsay are here, and go to- 
morrow to Torquay. I have by this post had a letter from John 
Murray, who seems to rejoice in his Highland castle. 

I have just written a pamphlet against Ballot, and shall publish 
it with my name at the proper time. I have done it to employ my 
leisure. No politics in it, but a bond fide discussion. I am an 
anti-ballotist. It will be carried, however, write I never so wisely. 

Lord Valletort possessed of Mount Edgecumbe, and bent double 
with rheumatism ! there is a balance in human conditions ! Charles 
Wynne is a truly good man. Pray remember me very kindly to 
Lushington, and beg he will come, with all his family, Professor 
and all, to Combe Florey. The curses of Glasgow are, itch, punch, 






LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 543 

cotton, and metaphysics. I hope Mr Lushington will discourage 
classical learning as much as he can. 

Nickleby is very good. I stood out against Mr Dickens as long 
as I could, but he has conquered me. 

Get, and read, Macaulay's Papers upon the Indian Courts and 
Indian Education. They are admirable for their talent and their 
honesty. We see why he was hated in India, and how honourable 
to him that hatred is. Your sincere friend, Sydney Smith. 



406.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

Combe Florey, September, 1838. 
Dear Lady Carlisle, 

I see by the papers that you are going abroad, which is all 
wrong ; but pray tell me how you and Lord Carlisle do, before you 
embark, and when you come back. 

We have had a great succession here of literary ladies. The 
Berrys are gone to Torquay, which they pronounce to be the most 
beautiful place in England, or out of it. They stayed some time 

with us, and were agreeable and good-natured. Then came , 

who talked to me a good deal about war and cannons. I thought 
him agreeable, but am advised to look him over again when I 

return to London. Luttrell and Mrs Marcet are here now. 

is staying here, whom I have always considered as the very type of 
Lovelace in " Clarissa Harlowe." It is impossible, you know, to 
read an interesting book, and not to clothe the characters in the 
flesh and blood of living people. He is Lovelace ; and who do 
you think is my imaginary Clarissa ? A certain lady who has been 
at Castle Howard, whom, on account of her purity, I dare not 

name, sojourning in Street, and an admirer of yours, and a 

friend of mine. Who can it be ? 

I have written the pamphlet you ordered upon the Ballot ; and 
as you love notoriety, I mean to dedicate it to you, with the most 
fulsome praise: virtues — talents — grace — elegance — illustrious 
ancestors — British feeling — mother of Morpeth — humble servant, 
&c. Your sincere and obliged friend, Sydney Smith. 



407.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, September, 1838. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I hope you are all well and safe at Howick. I have never stirred 
an inch from this place since I came from town, — six weeks since : 
an incredible time to remain at one place. This absence of loco- 
motion has however been somewhat secured by a fit of the gout, 



544 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

from which I am just recovered ; and which, under the old rS^ime, 
and before the reign of colchicum, would have laid me up for ten 
weeks instead of ten clays. I know you will quote against me Sir 
Oracle Hammick; but to him I oppose Sir Oracles Halford, Holland, 
Chambers, and Warren. 

Have you, or has Lord Grey, been among the wise men at New- 
castle ? Hcadlam asked me to go ; but, though I can endure 
small follies and absurdities, the nonsense of these meetings is too 
intense for my advanced years and delicate frame. One of the 
Bills for which I have been fighting so long has passed ; and I 
have the satisfaction of seeing that every point to which I objected 
has been altered ; so that I have not mingled in the affray for 
nothing. 

Pray tell me about yourself, and whether you are tolerably well ; 
but how can you be well, when you have so many children and so 
many anxieties afloat? How does dear Georgiana do? — that 
honest and transparent girl ; so natural, so cheerful, so true ! A 
moral flower, whom I always think of, when I sketch in my mind 
a garden of human creatures. 

Read Dr Spry's " Account of India," and believe, if you can (I 
do), that within one hundred and fifty miles of Calcutta there is a 
nation of cannibals living in trees. It is an amusing book. Read, 
also, Macaulay's Papers upon Indian Education, and the Adminis- 
tration of Justice in India ; but I hardly think you care about India. 

We have never been a single day without company, principally 
blue-stocking ladies, whose society Lord Grey so much likes. Be- 
lieve me, dear Lady Grey, your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



408.] To Lady Holland. 

September 6, 1838. 

If all the friends, dear Lady Holland, who have shared in your 
kindness and hospitality, were to give a little puff, you would be 
blown over to Calais with a gentle and prosperous gale. I admire 
your courage ; and earnestly hope, as I sincerely believe, that you 
will derive great amusement and satisfaction, and therefore im- 
proved health, from your expedition. 

I am out of temper with Lord Melbourne, and upon the subject 
of the Church ; but in case of an election, I should vote, as I always 
have done, with the Whigs. As for little John, I love him, though 
I chastise him. I have never lifted up my voice against the Duke 
of Lancaster ; I should be the most ungrateful of men if I did. 

We have had a run of blue-stocking ladies to Combe Florey this 
summer, a race you despise, To me they are agreeable, and less 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 545 

insipid than the general run of women ; for you know, my Lady, 
the female mind does not reason. Kindest regards to the Duke of 
Lancaster. S. S. 

409.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe F/orey, December, 1838. 

Awkward times, dear Lady Grey ! However, you see those you 
love sooner than you otherwise would have seen them, and see 
them safely returned from a bad climate and disturbed country ; 
and this is something, though not much. I do not see with whom 
Durham can coalesce. Not with Ministers, certainly; not with 

; not with Peel ; scarcely with the Radicals. I see no light 

as to his future march. Will these matters bring Lord Grey up to 
town at the beginning of the session ? I sincerely hope he may 
not think it necessary to place himself in such a painful and dis- 
tressing situation. I think the Whigs are damaged, and that they 
will have considerable difficulty in the registration. The Hibberts 
are here, helping us to spend the winter ; but nothing can make 
the country agreeable to me. It is bad enough in summer, but in 
winter is a fit residence only for beings doomed to such misery, for 
misdeeds in another state of existence. 

On Sunday I was on crutches, utterly unable to put my foot to 
the ground. On Tuesday I walked four miles. Such is the power 
of colchicum ! I shall write another letter about Church matters, 
and then take my leave of the subject ; also, as I believe I told 
you before, a pamphlet against the Ballot. 

What a strange affair is your Newcastle murder ! it is impossible 
to comprehend it. I think you will want a cunning man from Bow 
Street. Believe me, dear Lady Grey, ever your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

410.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe F/orey, Feb. 11, 1839. 
My dear Philips, 
I hear from George you have the gout, and that you have had it 
longer than you ought. It will be some comfort to you to know 
that I have had rather a sharp fit, which has turned my walking 
into waddling and limping. 

When do you come to town ? We shall be there on the 21st. 
I have sent you a pamphlet on the Ballot, and shall next week 
publish another letter to Archdeacon Singleton, and with that end 
the subject. You will of course think my pamphlet on Ballot to be 
on the wrong side of the question, but I think we are on the way 

2 M 



546 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

to the Devil. The Government have very wisely flung your friend 
overboard. 

I suspect Morpeth will be the new member of the Cabinet, per- 
haps the new Secretary for the Colonies. I presume Durham's 
statement was sent to the " Times " by himself. 

You ought to be very thankful that you are one of those persons 
who are born happy. If you had but ^200 per annum you would 
be happy. I have often said of you, that you are the happiest man, 
and the worst rider, I ever knew. 

I shall not be sorry to be in town. I am rather tired of simple 
pleasures, bad reasoning, and worse cookery. Yours, my dear 
Philips, very sincerely, Sydney Smith. 

411.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey, Feb. 12, 1839. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 
I have written a pamphlet upon the Ballot, and against it, and I 
would send it to you, but I know not how ; therefore you had better 
get it in the ordinary way. It is published at Longman and Co.'s. 
Pray read it and tell me what you' think of it. Only think of my 
being so good a boy as to write conservative pamphlets ! Did you 
ever think I should come to this ? One hole, you see, is made in 
the Ministry. Will it make such aleak as to sink the vessel, or will 
they stop it ? 

Give my love to your nice little daughter. Has she met yet with 
any dandy who has made her serious ? Your affectionate friend, 
Sydney Smith. 

412.] To Roderick Murchison, Esq. 

March 30, 1839. 
Dear Murchison, 
I deny " that the old stratified rocks of Devonshire and Cornwall 
are the equivalents of the Carboniferous and Old Red Sandstone 
systems." I hold the Professor * and you to this rash assertion, 
and I am determined to answer you. 

I am (whether you are right or wrong) very sorry you are going 
abroad. After I have answered you, I shall suspend my geological 
studies till you return ; but perhaps I shall be suspended myself. 
Sydney Smith. 

413.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Charles Street, April, 1839. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 
The Government is always crazy, but I see no immediate 

* Professor Sedgwick, who, with Mr Murchison, classified the rocks of Devonshire. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 547 

signs of dissolution. The success of my pamphlet has been very 
great. I always told you I was a clever man, and you never would 
believe me. 

You must study Macaulay when you come to town. He is incom- 
parably the first lion in the metropolis ; that is, he writes, talks, and 
speaks better than any man in England. 

Kind regards to your husband. SYDNEY SMITH. 



414.] To Charles Dickens, Esq. 

Charles Street, Berkeley Square, June 11, 1839. 
My dear Sir, 
Nobody more, and more justly, talked of than yourself. 
The Miss Berrys, now at Richmond, live only to become ac- 
quainted with you, and have commissioned me to request you to 
dine with them Friday, the 29th, or Monday, July 1st, to meet a 
Canon of St Paul's, the rector of Combe Florey, and the Vicar ot 
Halberton, — all equally well known to you ; to say nothing of other 
and better people. The Miss Berrys and Lady Charlotte Lindsay 
have not the smallest objection to be put into a Number, but, on 
the contrary, would be proud of the distinction ; and Lady Charlotte, 
in particular, you may marry to Newman Noggs. Pray come ; it 
is as much as my place is worth to send them a refusal. 

Sydney Smith. 

415.] To Mrs Grote. 

33 Charles Street, June 24, 1839. 

I will dine with you, dear Mrs Grote, on the nth, with great 
pleasure. 

The " Great Western " turns out very well, — grand, simple, cold, 

slow, wise, and good. I have been introduced to Miss ; she 

abuses the privilege of literary women to be plain: and, in addition, 
has the true Kentucky twang through the nose, converting that pro- 
montory into an organ of speech. How generous the conduct of 

Mrs , who, as a literary woman, might be ugly if she choose, 

but is as decidedly handsome as if she were profoundly ignorant ! 
I call such conduct honourable. 

You shall have a real philosophical breakfast here ; all mind- 
and-matter men. I am truly glad, my dear Mrs Grote, to add you 
to the number of my friends {i.e., if you will be added). I saw in 
the moiety of a moment that you were made of fine materials, and 
put together by a master workman ; and I ticketed you accordingly . 
But do not let me deceive you ; if you honour me with your notice, 
you will find me a theologian and a bigot, even to martyrdom. 



548 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Heaven forbid I should deny the right of Miss , or of any 

other lady to ask me to dinner! the only condition I annex is, 
that you dine there also. As for any dislikes of mine, I would not 
give one penny to avoid the society of any man in England. 

I do not preach at St Paul's before the first Sunday in July ; 
send me word (if you please) if you intend to come, and I (as the 
Americans say) will locate you. But do not flatter yourself with 
the delusive hope of a slumber ; I preach violently, and there is a 
strong smell of sulphur in my sermons. I could not get Lady — — 
to believe you did not know her ; she evidently considered it 
affectation. Why do you not consult Dr Turnbull upon tic- 
douloureux ? I told you a long story about it, of which, I thought 
at the time, you did not hear a single word. 

Adieu, dear Mrs Grote ! Always, with best compliments to Mr 
Grote, very sincerely yours, Sydney Smith. 



416.] To Mrs Grote. 

33 Charles Street, July 16, 1839. 
Dear Mrs Grote, 

I am very sorry you have suffered so much ; mine is not society 
sorrow, but real sorrow. If there is a real sign of a fool, it is to 
offer a remedy. Aconitine — why do you so despise it as not to ask 
a question about it ? 

I am truly glad you like what I have written ; then I have not 
written in vain. I send you a criticism on my three volumes, which, 
I confess, gave me a great deal of pleasure ; pray return it to me. 
I have not the smallest idea who wrote it ; but it is evidently 
written (my own vanity apart) by a very sensible man, and a good 
writer. Whether I have done what he says I have done, and am 
what he says I am, I do not know ; but he has justly stated what 
I always aimed at, and what I wished. to be. If I did not think you 
a very sensible woman, I would not run the risk of your thinking 
me vain ; but I honestly confess that the praise and approbation of 
wise men is to me a very great pleasure. 

I went last night to attend Mrs Sydney to the Eruption of Hecla 
at the Surrey Zoological ; we saw a pasteboard mountain, ejecting 
crackers and squibs. The long standing has given me a fit of the 
gout, and that renders it rather doubtful whether we can come to 
you ; but if I am well enough, we shall be most happy to do so. 
Let nothing ever persuade you to go to the Surrey Zoological in 
the evening. Mr Grote's subjects were intolerable. 

I did not know Charles Austin was a sayer of good things ; h$ 
has always seemed to me as something much better. Yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 549 

417.] To John Allen, Esq. 

1839. 
Dear Allen, 

What is the effect of ballot on America and in France ? My 
idea is, that in America nobody troubles himself how his inferiors 
vote, and that therefore it is a dead letter. Some States have it 
not ; some who had it, have exchanged it for open voting. Am I 
right in these suppositions ? 

Tell me something of its effects in France, as between the repre- 
sentative and the constituent, and between the members of the 
Chamber and the Government. You will much oblige me by giving 
me some knowledge on these topics. 

I had several fits of the gout of twelve hours' duration, and am 
now very well. Sydney Smith. 

418.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

Combe Florey, September, 1839. 

May I ask how my old friends do, and whether they are come 
back in good health and spirits ? 

I have done nothing since you went away but write little pam- 
phlets ; some, by your order, against Ballot, and others, by that of 
my own insubordinate spirit, against Bishops. 

I think you will find the Whigs damaged. I date their fall in 
public estimation from their return to office after resignation. 
Gallantry and the chivalrous spirit are admirable in all the com- 
mon courtesies of life ; indispensable, when ladies are to be handed 
to their carriages, or defended from rudeness ; but it ought not to 
meddle with politics. Most of the changes are bad. The appoint- 
ment of will offend the aristocracy here, and the Canadians. 

There is no prestige in it. If good sense be the only thing wanted, 
send an attorney at 6s. Zd. per day. is a bad ingredient too. 

We are both tolerably well. Mrs Sydney a little worse than her 
years, — myself a little better. Sydney Smith. 



419.] To the Countess Grey. 

Charles Street, 1839. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
My news is, that Government are to beat Lord Stanley by four 
or five ; and that, if beaten, they are not to go out. The threat of 
a dissolution has frightened some members into a support of the 
Government. It seems as if there were more danger of an Ameri- 
can, than of a French war. 

We arrived in town, taking eighty miles of the Bath railroad, 
with which I was delighted. Before this invention, man, richly en- 



55o LETTERS 01 THE RET. SYDNEY SMITH. 

dowed with gifts of mind and body, was deficient in locomotive 
powers. He could walk four miles an hour, whilst a wild goose 
could fly eighty in the same time. I can run now much faster than 
a fox or a hare, and beat a carrier pigeon or an eagle for a hundred 
miles. 

Had you the "Great Western," Mr Webster? and how did he 
answer ? Lord Grey, I know, hates " lions." 

God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! Sydney Smith. 

I have written another letter to Archdeacon Singleton, which, 
together with my pamphlet on the Ballot, have had remarkable 
success, and are left for you in Berkeley Square. 



420.] To Mrs Grote. 

Combe Florey, Oct. 2, 1839. 
Dear Mrs Grote, 

You have not mentioned a subject which would give me more 

pleasure than any other, — your health. Your neighbours, the , 

have been staying here; they talked of you eulogically, in which I 
cordially joined ; but when they came to details, 1 found they prin- 
c ipally admired you for a recipe for brown bread, which is made by 
2. baker near them according to your rules. I beg this recipe: and 
offer you, in return, a mode of curing hams. What a charming and 
sentimental commerce ! 

I cannot blame your decision, though I sincerely regret it ; all 
excursions of that kind are promised upon the supposition of aver- 
age moisture in the air, and average solidity in the soil. Your pre- 
dictions, however, though legitimately founded on probabilities, are 
contrary to the fact. The weather is fine, and the country beautiful. 
I should be very glad if you were here ; but what is deferred is not 
always lost. You have filled me with alarm about money, and I 
have buried a large sum in the garden ; Heaven send I may not 
forget in what bed ! But does not long continuation of bad weather 
produce low spirits in the rich ? Is Dives not occasionally affected 
by the Lazarophobia ? 

I don't know whether I am right, but I am extremely pleased with 
Jones's work upon Rent ; his style is admirable, his views always 
philosophical, and his explanations clear. You live in the midst of 
political economists ; pray tell me what they say about him. It 
must not be forgotten that he is a parson ; but as you overlook it 
in me, forgive it in him. I would not have mentioned this, but that 
1 am sure you would have heard it from his enemies. 

has the infirmity of deciding with the most fallacious 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 551 

rapidity, upon all human subjects. Trevelyan is one of the first 
and most distinguished men in India. 

Adieu ! It would have been a real pleasure to me to see you 
here ; pray come before you die, or rather, I should say, before I 
die. Ever, dear Mrs Grote, very sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

421.] To Lord Holland. 

Combe Florey, Oct. 5, 1839. 
My dear Lord Holland, 
This is an extract of a letter from Grant, of Rothiemurchis, to his 

daughter, Mrs , a friend of mine, who begs I will apply to you 

in his favour ; but you know him as well or better than I do ; and 
as he is a man of very liberal opinions, and always was so, when it 
was ruinous to entertain liberal opinions, I have no doubt you will 
strive to advance him, if you think he has other proper requisites. 

You have been through dangers of fire and water, I hope with 
impunity. Dr Holland is here, — at least I believe he is : for he is 
so locomotive, it is difficult to make similar assertions of him. 

S. S. 

422.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Green Street, October, 1839. 
Dear Mrs Meynell, 

I think the Whigs are certainly strengthened. Macaulay, if he 
speak as well as he did before India, must be considered an acqui- 
sition. Lord Clarendon, in all probability, a very important one. 
On the other side, they have had a great loss in Howick and Wood, 
and they lose three votes by the death of the two Dukes. They are 
in high spirits ; and I have no doubt the Queen's marriage will be 
the first thing notified to the new Parliament. I have heard it from 
nobody, but I have no doubt of it. 

I am quite delighted with my new house in Green Street. I have 
one leg in it, and the other here ; it is everything I want or wish. 

I feel for about her son at Oxford ; knowing, as I do, that 

the only consequences of a University education are, the growth of 
vice and the waste of money. 

I am in town all November. God bless you, dear friend ! 

Sydney Smith. 

423.] To Mrs . 

Green Street, Nov. 4, 1839. 

My dear Mrs , 

Tell me a little about yourself. W 7 here have you been? What 
have you been doing ? How have you been faring ? 



552 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

I have been living very quietly in Somersetshire, and am now in- 
tensely occupied in settling my new house, which is the essence of 
all that is comfortable. Pray come and see it, if you come to town, 
and write me word before you come. I will give you very good 
mutton-chops for luncheon, seasoned with affectionate regard and 
respect. 

My " Works " (such as they are) have had a very rapid sale, and 
I think before the end of the year will come to a second edition. 
Mrs Grote wrote me two or three letters in the course of the 
summer (which a certain person did not). She had half a mind to 
come to Combe Florey, but the other half was heavier and more 
powerful. What are your plans ? I hope you have some regard 
for me ; I have a great deal for you. Always affectionately yours, 
_________ Sydney Smith. 

424.] To Lady Holland. 

December 28, 1839. 

I will dine with you on Saturday, my dear Lady Holland, with 
the greatest pleasure. 

I have written against one of the cleverest pamphlets I ever 

read, which I think would cover and him with ridicule. At 

least it made me laugh very much in reading it ; and there I stood, 
with the printer's devil, and the real devil close to me ; and then I 
said, " After all, this is very funny, and very well written, but it will 
give great pain to people who have been very kind and good to me 
through life ; and what can I do to show my sense of that kindness, 
if it is not by flinging this pamphlet into the fire ? " So I flung it 
in, and there was an end ! My sense of ill-usage remains of course 

the same. The dialogue between and is, or I 

should rather say, was, most admirable. Sydney Smith. 



425.] To Mrs Crowe. 

January 6, 1840. 

I am very glad to find, dear Mrs Crowe, that you are so comfort- 
ably arranged at Edinburgh. I am particulary glad that you are 
intimate with Jeffrey. He is one of the best, as well as the ablest, 
men in the country : and his friendship is to you, honour, safety, 
and amusement. 

I hate young men, and I hate soldiers ; but I will be gracious to 
■ , if he will call upon me. 

Among the many evils of getting old, one is, that every little ill- 
ness may probably be the last. You feel like a delinquent who 
knows that the constable is looking out after him. I am not going 
to live at Barnes, or to quit Combe Florey ; if ever I do quit Combe 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 553 

Florey, it will probably be to give up my country livings, and to 
confine myself to London only. 

My " Works" are now become too expensive to allow of the dis- 
persion and presentation of many copies, but I shall with pleasure 
order one for you : the bookseller will send it. I printed my reviews 
to show, if I could, that I had not passed my life merely in making 
jokes ; but that I had made use of what little powers of pleasantry 
I might be endowed with, to discountenance bad, and to encourage 
liberal and wise, principles. The publication has been successful. 
The liberal journals praise me to the skies ; the Tories are silent, 
grateful for my attack upon the Ballot. Yours truly, 

Sydney Smith. 

426.] To Mrs . 

Combe Florey ', Jan. 23, 1840. 
Dear, fair, wise, 

Your little note gave me great pleasure, for I am always mightily 
refreshed when the best of my fellow-creatures seem to remember 
and care for me. To you, who give routs where every gentleman 
is a Locke or a Newton, and every lady a Somerville or a Corinne, 
the printed nonsense you have sent me must appear extraordinary ; 
but to me, in the country, it is daily-bread nonsense, and of ever- 
lasting occurrence. 

The birds, presuming on a few fine days, are beginning to make 
young birds, and the roots to make young flowers. Very rash ! as 
rash as John Russell with his Privilege quarrel. 

I have not read Carlyle, though I have got him on my list. I 
am rather curious about him. 

I will come and see you as soon as I come to town ; in the 
meantime, believe me your sincere and affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



427.] To Mrs . 

Green Street ', Ap?'il 8, 1 840. 

Dear Mrs , 

I wish I may be able to come on Monday, but I doubt. Will 
you come to a philosophical breakfast on Saturday, — ten o'clock 
precisely? Nothing taken for granted! Everything (except the 
Thirty-nine Articles) called in question — real philosophers ! 

We shall have some routs and dinners in May, when I shall 

hope to see you. Many thanks, dear Mrs , for your kind 

expressions towards me. They are never (when they come from 
you) cast on barren and ungrateful soil. Affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



554 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

J\S. -My carriage shall call for you to-morrow at a quarter past 

ten, at Mrs % whence we will proceed to that scene of simplicity, 

truth, and nature,— a London rout. 



428.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Green Street, June, 1840. 
Thy servant is threescorc-and-ten years old ; can he hear the 
sound of singing men and singing women? A Canon at the 
Opera ! Where have you lived ? In what habitations of the 
heathen ? I thank you, shuddering ; and am ever your unreducible 
friend, Sydney Smith. 

429.] To Lady Holland. 

52 Marine Parade, Brighton, June, 1840. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

You will (because you are very good-natured) be glad to hear 
that Brighton is rapidly restoring Mrs Sydney to health. She gets 
better every three hours ; and if she goes on so, I shall begin to be 
glad that Dr is not here. 

I am giving a rout this evening to the only three persons I have 
yet discovered at Brighton. I have had handbills printed to find 
other London people, but I believe there are none. I shall stay 
till the 28th. You must allow the Chain Pier to be a great luxury; 
and I think all rich and rational people living in London should 
take small doses of Brighton from time to time. There cannot be 
a better place than this to refresh metropolitan gentleman and 
ladies, wearied with bad air, falsehood, and lemonade. 

I am very deep in Lord Stowell's " Reports," and if it were war- 
time I should officiate as judge of the Admiralty Court. It was a 
fine occupation to make a public law for all nations, or to confirm 
one ; and it is rather singular that so sly a rogue should have done 
it so honestly. Yours ever, Sydney Smith. 



430.] To Lady Ashburton. 

June, 1840. 
I choose to appear in your eyes a consistent and intelligent 
clergyman, and therefore must explain how I am at Brighton and 
in Berkeley Square at the same time on the 17th. I purpose to be 
at Brighton from the 14th to the 28th ; coming up to eat off two or 
three engagements I had previously contracted, but not accepting 
any fresh engagements for that period. S. S# 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 555 

431.] To John Whishaw, Esq. 

Combe Florey, August 26, 1840. 
My dear Whishaw, 

I read the death of the Bishop of Chichester with sincere regret, 
— a thoroughly good and amiable man, and as liberal as a bishop 
is permitted to be. I am much obliged to you for mentioning those 
circumstances which marked his latter end, and made the spectacle 
less appaling to those who witnessed it. Milnes has been here ; to 
him succeeded our friend Mrs Grote, who is now here, and very 
agreeable ; she will remain with us, I hope, over Sunday. 

I send you, by the post, my letter to the Bishop of London. It 
will not escape you that the King of Clubs was long in a state of 
spiritual destitution, as were the Edinburgh Reviewers,— all except 
me. Mrs Sydney is much better than she was this time last year ; 
the ventilation she got at Brighton still continues to minister to her 
health. I am scarcely ever free from gout, and still more afflicted 
with asthma, but keep up my spirits. I am truly glad to hear such 
accounts of your health, and remain, my dear Whishaw, ever sin- 
cerely and affectionately yours, Sydney Smith. 



432.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

September 5, 1840. 

I should be very glad to hear how all is going on at Castle 
Howard, dear Lady Carlisle, and whether my Lord and you keep 
up health and spirits with tolerable success ;— a difficult task in 
the fifth act of life, when the curtain must erelong drop, and the 
comedy or tragedy be brought to an end. 

Mrs Sydney is still living on the stock of health she laid up at 
Brighton ; I am pretty well, except gout, asthma, and pains in all 
the bones, and all the flesh, of my body. What a very singular 
disease gout is ! It seems as if the stomach fell down into the 
feet. The smallest deviation from right diet is immediately pun- 
ished by limping and lameness, and the innocent ankle and blame- 
less instep are tortured for the vices of the nobler organs. The 
stomach having found this easy way of getting rid of inconven- 
iences, becomes cruelly despotic, and punishes for the least offences. 
A plum, a glass of champagne, excess in joy, excess in grief, — any 
crime, however small, is sufficient for redness, swelling, spasms, 
and large shoes. 

I have found it necessary to give a valedictory flagellation. 

I know you and my excellent friend, Earl Carlisle, disapprove of 
these things ; but you must excuse all the immense differences of 
temper, training, situation, habits, which make Sydney Smith one 
sort of person, and the Lord of the Castle another, — and both right 



556 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

in their way. Lord Carlisle does not like the vehicle of a news • 
paper ; but if a man want to publish what is too short for a pam- 
phlet, what other vehicle is there? Lord Lansdowne, and Phil- 
potts, and the Bishop of London make short communications in 
newspapers. The statement of duels is made in newspapers by the 
first men in the country. To write anonymously in a newspaper is 
an act of another description ; but if I put my name to what I 
write, the mere vehicle is surely immaterial ; and I am to be tried, 
not by where I write, but what I write. I send the newspaper. 

Ah, dear Lady Carlisle ! do not imagine, because I did not knock 
every day at your door, and molest you with perpetual inquiries, 
that I have been inattentive to all that has passed, and careless of 
what you and Lord Carlisle have suffered. I have a sincere re- 
spect and affection for you both, and shall never forget your great 
kindness to me. God bless and preserve you ! 

Sydney Smith. 

433.] To Lady Davy. 

Gree7i Street, Nov. 28, 1840. 
Dear Lady Davy, 
Do you remember that passage in the " Paradise Lost" which is 
considered so beautiful ? — 

" As one who, long in populous cities pent, 
Where houses thick and sewers annoy the air, 
Forth issuing on a summer's morn, to breathe 
Among the pleasant villages and farms 
Adjoin'd, from each thing met conceives delight ; 
The smell of grain, or tedded grass, or kine, 
Or flowers : each rural sight, each rural sound. 
If chance with nymph-like step fair virgin pass, 
What pleasing seem'd, for her now pleases more, 
She most ; and in her look sums all delight." 

I think this simile very unjust to London, and I have amended 
the passage. I read it over to Lady Charlotte Lindsay and the 
Miss Berrys. The question was, whom the gentleman should see 
first when he arrived in London : and after various proposals, it was 
at last unanimously agreed it must heyoit : so it stands thus : — 

" As one who, long in rural hamlets pent, 
Where squires and parsons deep potations make, 
With lengthen'd tale of fox, or timid hare, 
Or antler'd stag, sore vext by hound and horn, 
Forth issuing on a winter's morn, to reach 
In chaise or coach the London Babylon 
Remote, from each thing met conceives delight ; 
Or cab, or car, or evening muffin-bell, 
Or lamps : each city sight, each city sound. 
If chance with nymph-like step the Davy pass, 
What pleasing seem'd, for her now pleases more, 
She most ; and in her look sums all delight. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 557 

I tried the verses with names of other ladies, but the universal 
opinion was, in the conclave of your friends, that it must be you ; 
and this told, now tell me, dear Lady Davy, how do you do ? Shall 
we ever see you again ? We are dying very fast here ; come and 
take another look at us. Mrs Sydney is in the country, in rather 
bad health ; I am (gout and asthma excepted) very well. 

The sword is slowly and reluctantly returning into its scabbard. 
The Ministry hangs by a thread. We are alarmed by the Auck- 
land war. 

You are much loved here, and much lamented ; and this is 
pleasant, even though thousands of miles intervene. I should be 
glad to know that anybody under the equator or the southern 
tropic held me in regard and esteem. Sydney Smith. 



434.] To R. Murchison, Esq. 

Combe Florey, 1840. 
Dear Murchison, 

Many thanks for your kind recollections of me in sending me 
your pamphlet, which I shall read with all attention and care. My 
observation has been necessarily so much fixed on missions of 
another description, that I am hardly reconciled to -zealots going 
out with voltaic batteries and crucibles, for the conversion of man- 
kind, and baptizing their fellow-creatures with the mineral acids ; 
but I will endeavour to admire, and believe in you. My real alarm 
for you is, that by some late decisions of the magistrates, you come 
under the legal definition of strollers ; and nothing would give me 
more pain than to see any of the Sections upon the mill, calculat- 
ing the resistance of the air, and showing the additional quantity 
of flour which might be ground in vacuo, — each man in the mean- 
time imagining himself a Galileo. 

Mrs Sydney has eight distinct illnesses, and I have nine. We 
take something every hour, and pass the mixture from one to 
the other. 

About forty years ago, I stopped an infant in Lord Breadalbane's 
grounds, and patted his face. The nurse said, "Hold up your 
head, Lord Glenorchy." This was the President of your society.* 
He seems to be acting an honourable and enlightened part in life. 
Pray present my respects to him and his beautiful Marchioness. 

Sydney Smith. 

Since writing this I have read your Memoir, — a little too flowery, 
but very sensible and good. 

* Mr Murchison was attending the British Association for the Advancement of 
Science, that met at Glasgow. The President was the Marquis of Breadalbane. 



553 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

435.] To Mrs . 

56 Green Street, Nov. 18, 1840. 

An earthquake may prevent me, dear Mrs , a civil com- 
motion attended with bloodshed, or fatal disease, — but it must be 
some cause as powerful as these. Pray return the enclosed when 
you have read it, as I have borrowed it. Yours affectionately, 

S. S. 

I have heard from Mrs Grote, who is very well, and amusing 
herself with Horticulture and Democracy, — the most approved 
methods of growing cabbages and destroying kings. 



436.] To the Countess of Morley. 

Combe Florey, 1 840. 
Dear Lady Morley, 

Many thanks for a letter which was very agreeable to Mrs 
Sydney and myself. The former of these personages is much 
better, and complains principally of increased dimensions, as the 
old Indians do of our Indian empire. 

I am always glad when London time arrives ; it always seems in 
the country as if Joshua were at work, and had stopped the sun. 
You, dear Lady Morley, have the reverse of Joshua's talent, and 
accelerate the course of that luminary : — 

By force prophetic Joshua stopp'd the sun, 
But Morley hastens on his course with fun, 
Aud listeners scarce believe the day is done. 

Rumours have reached us of your dramatic fame. 

The Bishop of London is behaving very well, and very like a man 
of sense. Admirable proclamation from Jackson. Read Lady 
Dacre — very good. 

But I am getting garrulous, and will only add that I am, dear 
Lady Morley, with sincere respect and regard, yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

437.] To the Countess Grey. 

Green Street, Nov. 29, 1840. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

No war, as you perceive ; and Palmerston's star rising in the 
heavens. People who know that country say it is impossible the 
Turks can keep Syria. We seem dreadfully entangled in Oriental 
matters. Trade is very dull and falling off; and the Revenue, as 
you see, very deficient. 

Melbourne gives up all foreign affairs to Palmerston, swearing 
at it all. Lord Grey would never have suffered any Minister for 
Foreign Affairs "to have sent such a despatch as Palmerston's note 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 559 

to Guizot ; it is universally blamed here. Pray don't go to war 
with France : that must be wrong. 

I see Francis has vindicated himself from going to Dissenting 
chapels, with all the fervour of one who feels he will be a bishop. 

The fallen prebendaries, like the devils in the first book of Milton, 

are shaking themselves, and threatening war against the of 

. I am endeavouring to imitate Satan. 

You never say a word of yourself, dear Lady Grey. You have 
that dreadful sin of anti-egotism. When I am ill, I mention it to 
all my friends and relations, to the lord lieutenant of the county, the 
justices, the bishop, the churchwardens, the booksellers and editors 
of the Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviews. God bless you, dear 
Lady Grey ! Sydney Smith. 

438.] To Mrs Grote. 

Combe Florey^ Dec. 20, 1 840. 

I am improved in lumbago, but still less upright than Aristides. 
Our house is full of beef, beer, young children, newspapers, libels, 
and mince-pies, and life goes on very well, except that I am often 

reminded I am too near the end of it. I have been trying 's 

"Lectures on the French Revolution," which I could not get on with, 

and am reading Thiers, which I find it difficult to lay down. is 

long and feeble j and though you are tolerably sure he will be dull, you 
are not equally sure he will be right. We are covered with snow, but 
utterly ignorant of what cold is, as are all natural philosophers. 

What a remarkable woman she must be, that Mrs Grote ! she 
uses the word " thereto." Why use antiquated forms of expression ? 
Why not wear antiquated caps and shoes ? Of all women living, 
you least want these distinctions. 

I join you sincerely in your praise of ; she is beautiful, she 

is clear of envy, hatred, and malice, she is very clear of prejudices, 
she has a regard for me. 

It will be a great baronet season, — a year of the Bloody Hand. 
I know three more baronets I can introduce you to, and four or five 
knights ; but, I take it, the mock-turtle of knights will not go down. 
I see how it will end ; Grote will be made a baronet ; and if he is 
not, I will. The Ministers, who would not make me a bishop, can't 
refuse to make me a baronet. I remain always your attached 
friend, Sydney Smith. 

4.39.] To Lord Hatherton. 

Dover : no date {about 1840). 
Dear Littleton, 
Your invitation has followed me to this place. I wish I could 
accept it ; but about forty years ago I contracted an obligation to 



$6o LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

cherish my wife,* and I have been obliged to bring her here ; not. 
that I am gulled by the sight of green fields and the sound of sing- 
ing-birds, — I am too old for that. To my mind there is no verdure 

in the creation like the green of 's face, and Luttrell talks more 

sweetly than birds can sing. Sydney Smith. 



440.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe F/orey, Jan. 3, 1841. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I hope you are better than when I left town, and that you have 
found a house. I have had two months' holiday from gout. Do 
not imagine I have forgotten my annual tribute of a cheese, but my 
carriage is in the hands of the doctor, and I have not been able to 
get to Taunton ; for I cannot fall into that absurd English fashion 
of going in open carriages in the months of December and January, 
— seasons when I should prefer to go in a bottle, well corked and 
sealed. 

The Hibberts are here, and the house full, light, and warm. 
Time goes on well. I do all I can to love the country, and endea- 
vour to believe those poetical lies which I read in Rogers and 
others, on the subject ; which said deviations from truth were, by 
Rogers, all written in St James's Place. 

I have long since got rid of all ambition and wish for distinctions, 
and am much happier for it. The journey is nearly over, and I am 
careless and good-humoured ; at least good-humoured for me, as 
it is not an attribute which has been largely conceded to me by Pro- 
vidence. Accept my affectionate and sincere good wishes. 

Sydney Smith. 

441.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe F/orey, Jan. 25, 1841. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 
Pray say all that is kind on my part to Miss Poulter, and express 
how much flattered I am by her present. I have no imagination 
myself, but am deeply in admiration of those who have ; pray beg 
that we may meet as old friends, and embrace wherever we meet. 
I shall be in town the 17th of February. The Hibberts have sud- 
denly left us, and we are in a state of collapse. We are all pretty 
well, my asthma excepted. Ever, dear G., affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

* Mrs Sydney had been seriously ill, and he had been anxious she should try change 
of air. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 561 

442.] To Mrs Crowe. 

Combe Florey, Jan. 31, 1841. 
Dear Mrs Crowe, 

I quite agree with you as to the horrors of correspondence. 
Correspondences are like small-clothes before the invention of sus« 
penders ; it is impossible to keep them up. 

That episode of Julia is much too long. Your incidents are 
remarkable for their improbability. A boy goes on board a frigate 
in the middle of the night, and penetrates to the captain's cabin 
without being seen or challenged. Susan climbs into a two-pair-of- 
stairs window to rescue two grenadiers. A gentleman about to be 
murdered, is saved by rescuing a woman about to be drowned, and 
so on. The language is easy, the dialogue natural. There is a 
great deal of humour ; the plot is too complicated. The best part 
of the book is Mr and Mrs Ay ton ; but the highest and most im- 
portant praise of the novel is that you are carried on eagerly, and 
that it excites and sustains a great interest in the event, and there- 
fore I think it a very good novel, and will recommend it. 

It is in vain that I study the subject of the Scotch Church. I 
have heard it ten times over from Murray, and twenty times from 
Jeffrey, and I have not the smallest conception what it is about. 
I know it has something to do with oatmeal, but beyond that I am 
in utter darkness. Everybody here is turning Puseyite. Having 
worn out my black gown, I preach in my surplice ; this is all the 
change I have made, or mean to make. 

There seems to be in your letter a deep-rooted love of the amuse- 
ments of the world. Instead of the ever-gay Murray and the never- 
silent Jeffrey, why do you not cultivate the Scotch clergy and the 
elders and professors ? I should then have some hopes of you. 
_______ Sydney Smith. 

443.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Feb. 6, 1841. 

Many thanks, my dear Lady Grey, for your inquiries. Mrs 
Sydney is better than she has been for a long time ; I have no gout, 
but am suffering from inflamed eyes proceeding from much reading 
and writing. Reading and writing, God knows, to very little use, 
but resorted to in the country from not knowing what else to do. 

I read Guizot's " Washington" in the summer. Nothing can be 
better, more succinct, more judicious, more true, more just ; but I 
have done with reviewing. I will write when I have collected some 
news for you in London. I have read " Susan Hopley." The in- 
cidents are improbable, but the book took me on, and I kept 
reading it. Sydney Smith. 

2 x 



562 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

444.] TO R, MONCKTON MlLNES, ESQ. 

Combe Florey, Feb. 7, 1 841. 
Dear Milnes, 

Pray tell me if you remember my commission of papier chwiique; 
I am afraid you only thought of papier politique. You are generally 
supposed to be the author of all the late measures of the French 
Cabinet. 

I purpose to be in town on the 17th, but the elements seem to 
purpose that I shall not. I often exclaim to the descending snow, 
" Pourquoi tant de fracas pour le voyage d'un chanoine a Londres? " 

Answer this letter, dear Milnes, by return of post, or you shall 
have a poor time of it when I arrive. Sydney Smith. 



445- ] To R. Monckton Milnes, Esq. 

Co7nbe Florey, Feb. 14, 1841. 
My dear Sir, 
I am very much obliged by your kindness in procuring for me the 
papier chimique. Pray let me know what I am in your debt : it is 
best to be scrupulous and punctilious in trifles. I should be very 
unhappy about Maclcod and America, if I had not impressed upon 
myself, in the course of a long life, that there is always some misery 
of this kind hanging over us, and that being unhappy does no good. 
I console myself with Doddridge's Exposition and " The Scholar 
Armed," to say nothing of a very popular book, " The Dissenter 
Tripped up." I remain, my dear Sir, yours faithfully, 

Sydney Smith. 

446.] To R. Monckton Milnes, Esq. 

Munden House, Friday, nth, 1841. 
Dear Milnes, 
I will not receive you on these terms, but postpone you for safer 
times. I cannot blame you ; but, seriously, dinners are destroyed 
by the inconveniences of a free Government. I have filled up your 
place, and bought your book. Sydney Smith. 



447.] To Mrs . 

Green Street, Grosvenor Square, March 5, 1841. 
My dear Mrs — — , 
At the sight of , away fly gaiety, ease, carelessness, happi- 
ness. Effusions are checked, faces are puckered up ; coldness, for- 
mality, and reserve are diffused over the room, and the social tem- 
perature falls down to zero. I could not stand it. I know you will 
forgive me, but my constitution is shattered, and I have not nerves 
for such an occurrence. S. S. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 563 

448. J To Mrs . 

March 6, 1841. 
My dear Mrs , 

Did you never hear of persons who have an aversion to cheese ? 
to cats ? to roast hare ? Can you reason them out of it ? Can you 
write them out of it ? Would it be of any use to mention the 
names of mongers who have lived in the midst of cheese ? Would 
it advance your cause to insist upon the story of Whittington and 
his Cat ! 

As for you, dear Mrs , I have a sincere regard for you, and 

that you well know. I am truly sorry you are going. Mrs Sydney 
and I dine out together, and will both come to you after, if possible, 
or if impossible. Excuse all this nonsense. Ever, with true affec- 
tion and friendship, yours, S. S. 

449.] TO R. MONCKTON MlLNES, ESQ. 

Green Street, May 11, 1841. 
Dear Milnes, 
I am very much obliged by your reserving a place for me, but I 
have a party of persons who are coming to breakfast with me ; all 
very common persons, I am ashamed to say, who see with their 
eyes, hear with their ears, and trust to the olfactory nerves to dis- 
criminate filth from fragrance. Pray come to us on Thursday, 
and (O Milnes !) save the country ! Sydney Smith. 



450.] To Mrs Meynell* 

Green Street, May 22, 1841. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

This paper was quite white when it came here ; it is the constant 
effect of our street. 

I had a slight attack of fever, which kept me in bed for two nights, 
and was followed by a slight attack of gout. I am now tolerably 
well for a person who is never quite well. We spent two or three 
days at the Archbishop of York's, at Nuneham. There were Lord 
and Lady Burghersh, Rogers, and Granville Vernon : his daughter 
is a mass of perfections. I am glad your girl likes me. Give my 
love to her. I do not despair one day of convincing her of the 
superiority of the pavement over grass ; but she is charming, and 
as fresh-minded as a sunbeam just touching the earth for the first 
time. 

We are five hours and' a half to Bridgewater, and from Bridge- 
water eleven miles. Till now I have lived for three days on waiters 
and veal cutlets. God bless you ! Ever affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

* Written on green paper. 



564 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

451.] To Mrs Grote. 

May 30, 1 841. 
The devil has left me, dear Mrs Grote, and I can walk. I am 
as proud of the new privilege of walking as Mr Grote would be of 
a peerage ; but I will not abuse it, as I have done before. ... I 
have an unpleasant feeling to-day, and upon thinking what it is, I 
find that you are out of London ; therefore the quantity of intelligent 
matter caring about, and understanding, and loving me, is sensibly 
diminished. . . . Tell me if you will come to my breakfast on 
Saturday. Sydney Smith. 

452.] To the Earl Grey. 

No date. 
My dear Lord Grey, 
I have been to-day to see the cartoons, and I am quite delighted 
with them. I think Hammick is a tyrant, if he will not let you go. 
You will be able to see them perfectly well. I had no conception 
there was so much genius, so much cartoonery, such a power of 
grouping, and such accuracy of drawing, in the country. I never 
was more pleased ; and I will never look again at an oil painting, 
except it should be of you, and that will excite in me all the senti- 
ments of regard, respect, and gratitude I feel for the original. Ever 
yours, Sydney Smith. 

453.] To Mrs Procter. 

June, 185 1. 
Dear Mrs Procter, 

May I drink tea with you the 15th ? (it is not Milnes writing, 
but Sydney Smith), but may I ? It will be a great pleasure to me, 
if not inconvenient to you. 

I thank you sincerely for the Poems, which I will not only read, 
but sing. You have lent me also Cobbett's Advice to Young Men, 
a book therefore, well suited to my time of life. 

I hope you have been passing your time agreeably, or rather I 
should say, disagreeably, as I have not benefited by your proximity ; 
but this London — it is a charming place, but I never do there what 
I please, or see those I like. At this moment, when I am agreeably 
occupied in writing to you, there is a loud knock at the door. 

I am about to suspend animation in the country for a week, and 
I beg you to answer my request at Munden House, Watford, Herts. 
Animate, semi-animate, or in the full flow of metropolitan life, 1 
remain, my dear Madam, truly yours, Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — I write on this paper because it is the colour in which I 
wish to see every object in human life.* 

* The paper is rose-colour, — A- B. P. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 565 

454.] To Miss G. Harcourt. 

Combe Florey, July 24, 1841. 
My dear Georgiana, 

That innocent Betty may not be blamed, and that I may not be 
suspected of larceny, I must tell you that I have innocently and 
unconsciously carried away your silver pencil-case. I would con- 
tinue to steal it, only it may be a gift from a friend. 

I enjoyed my visit at Nuneham very much. It gave me great 
pleasure to see the best of Archbishops in the best of health and 
spirits. Your niece Marianne pleased me very much ; she has a 
volume of good qualities. In short, I was pleased with everybody 
and displeased with nobody, and yet I had the gout all the time, 
and often painfully ; but principally, dear Georgiana, I was pleased 
with you, because you are always kind and obliging to your old 
and sincere friend, Sydney Smith. 

455.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Aug. 24, 1841. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I hope that Lord Grey and you are continuing in robust health. 
We are tolerably well here ; the gout is never far off, though not 
actually present ; it is the only enemy that I do not wish to have 
at my feet. 

I hear Morpeth is going to America, a resolution I think very 
wise, and which I should decidedly carry into execution myself, if 
I were not going to heaven. 

We have had divers people at Combe Florey, but none whom 
you would particularly care about. How many worlds there are 
in this one world ! We are just nine hours from door to door by 
the railroad. The Gaily Knights left Combe Florey after nine 
o'clock, and were in Grosvenor Street before six. I call this a very 
serious increase of comfort. I used to sleep two nights on the 
road ; and to travel with a pair of horses is miserable work. I 
dare say the railroad has added ten per cent, to the value of pro- 
perty in this neighbourhood. 

We are in great alarm here for the harvest. It is all down, and 
growing as it stands. It is Whig weather, and favourable to John 
Russell's speeches on the Corn Laws. Remember me very kindly 
to Lord Grey and Georgiana, and believe me your steady and 
affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 

456.] To Lady Davy. 

Combe Florey », Aug. 31, 1841. 
My dear Lady Davy, 
I thank you for your very kind letter, which gave to Mrs Sydney 



566 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

and to myself much pleasure, and carried us back agreeably into 
past times. We are both tolerably well, bulging out like old 
houses, but with no immediate intention of tumbling down. The 
country is in a state of political transition, and the shabby are pre- 
paring their consciences and opinions for a tack. 

I think all our common friends are doing well. Some are fatter, 
some more spare, none handsomer ; but, such as they are, I think 
you will see them all again. But pray do you ever mean to see 
any of us again ? or do you mean to end your days at Rome ? a 
town, I hear, you have entirely enslaved, and where, in spite of 
your Protestantism, you are omnipotent. Your Protestantism (but 
I confess that reflection makes me melancholy) — your attachment 
to the clergy generally — the activity of your mind — the Roman 
Catholic spirit of proselytism — all alarm me. I am assured they 
will get hold of you, and we shall lose you from the Church ot 
England. Only promise me that you will not give up till you have 
subjected their arguments to my examination, and given me a 
chance of reply : tell them that there is un Canonico dottissimo to 
whom you have pledged your theological faith. Excuse my zeal ; 
it is an additional proof of my affection. Believe me, dear Lady 
Davy, your affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 



457. To Miss G. Harcourt. 

Combe Florey^ September, 1841. 
My dear Georgiana, 

There is something awful and mysterious in the curled cress- 
seed you sent me. Some of it will not come up at all ; other seeds 
put on the form of all sorts of plants, and will in time be oaks and 
elm-trees. We wait the result in patience, and you shall hear it. 

There is an end of all earthly Whiggism, and that unfortunate 
class of men are getting into holes and corners as fast as possible. 
Some are taking orders, some are going to the Continent, some to 
America, some going over to Peel, some to Jerusalem. I think 

very likely to marry a Circassian, a large convex lady, filling 

up great space morally and physically. He is an ambitious man, 
though he looks as if his brethren had just sold him to the 
Ishmaelite merchants. 

Mr seems to be the most important man north of the 

Humber. How can it be otherwise, dear Georgiana, with such 
felicities in the pulpit as "the brilliant reptile's polished fang?" 
Massillon has nothing equal to this. 

We have had a great deal of company. Of all the saints, I hate 
La Trappe the most : I believe he has been canonised. I wrote to 
W , at Plymouth, conceiving him to be among the philosophers, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 567 

of course, and not believing that an acid and an alkali would com- 
bine without him. Having received no answer from him, I imagined 
he had either quitted the world or the Established Church : or that 

he was composing a pamphlet against Dr Simon Magus the . 

My kind regards to him. 

I am delighted to hear of the health and activity of the Arch- 
bishop. Present to him, if you please, my homage. Your affec- 
tionate friend, Sydney Smith. 

458.] To Mrs Grote. 

Sidmouth, Sept. 14, 1841. 
Dear Mrs Groie, 

We are come here for a few days ; it is very lovely, and very 
stupid. Your excursion to Brittany will be very pleasant, but not 
for the reasons you give. I have no idolatry for Madame de 
Se'vigne ; she had merely a fine epistolary style. There is not a 
page of Madame de Stael where there is not more thought, and 
very often, thoughts as just as they are new. 

I am drawing up a short account of the late Francis Horner, 
which Leonard Horner is to insert in a Memoir he is about to 
publish of his brother : I read it to Mrs Sydney, who was much 
pleased with it, and I think you will not dislike it. I wish you had 
known Horner. 

There is a report that the curates are about to strike, that they 
have mobbed several rectors, and that a body of bishops' chaplains 
are coming down by the railroad to disperse them. Thank God, 
the heat; are passed away ; I was completely exhausted, gave up 
locomotion, and poured cold water on my head. 

You do not say, but I presume you leave England the beginning 
of October. I will endeavour to look as much like the- Apollo 
Belvidere as a corpulent Canon can do, when you return. Your 
sincere friend, Sydney Smith. 

459.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Oct. 8, 1841. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I do not believe that Peel had anything to do, as some of the 
Whigs believe, with the shooting at Lord Howick ; however, I am 
very glad he survives, and is returned to Parliament, where, from 
his abilities and station, he has such an undoubted right to be. I 
am glad to find you are all so well. I am not ill, but should be 
much better if I lived in a colder climate. Lady Georgiana is one 
of the best persons in the world, and is always sure to do what is 
right. 

I see Mr has been fighting the Puseyites. I am sorry for 



568 LETTERS OF 'I HE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

it, because, as his sincere friend, I wish he would neither speak nor 
write. He is a thoroughly amiable, foolish, learned man, and had 
better bring himself as little into notice as possible. 

Pray read the first volume of Elphinstone's " India." The news 
from China gives me the greatest pleasure. I am for bombarding 
all the exclusive Asiatics, who shut up the earth, and will not let 
me walk civilly and quietly through it, doing no harm, and paying 
for all I want. We are in for a dozen years of Tory power at least, 
and the country will fast lapse into monarchical and ecclesiastical 
habits. In all revolutions of politics, I shall always remain, dear 
Lady Grey, sincerely and affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

460.] To Mrs . 

Green Street, Oct. 29 ,1841. 
My dear Mrs , 

It grieves me to think you will not be in England this winter. 
The privations of winter are numerous enough without this. The 
absence of leaves and flowers I could endure, and am accustomed 
to ; but the absence of amiable and enlightened women I have not 
hitherto connected with the approach of winter, and I do not at all 
approve of it. 

Great forgeries of Exchequer Bills in England, and all the world 
up in arms ; the evil to the amount of ,£200.000 or ,£300,000. San- 
guine people imagine Lord Monteagle will be hanged. I am a 
holder of Exchequer Bills to some little amount, and am quaking 
for fear. Poor Jeffrey is at Empson's, very ill, and writing in a 
melancholy mood of himself. He seems very reluctant to resign 
his seat on the Bench, and no wonder, where he gains every day 
great reputation, and is of great use ; — still he may gain a few years 
of life if he will be quiet, and fall into a private station. 

Mrs Grote is, I presume, abroad, collecting at Rome, for Roebuck 
and others, anecdotes of Catiline and the Gracchi. She came to 
Combe Florey again this year, which was very kind and flattering. 
I have a high opinion of, and a real affection for her ; she has an 
excellent head, and an honest and kind heart. 

The Tories are going on quite quietly, and are in for a dozen 
years. I am living in London this winter quite alone ; — pity me, 
and keep for me a little portion of remembrance and regard. Your 
affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 

461.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Munden House, Watford, 1841. 
My dear Murray, 
I am extremely obliged by your kind attention in writing to mt 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 569 

respecting the illness of our friend Jeffrey ; I had seen it in the 
papers of to-day for the first time, just as your letter arrived, and 
was about to write. Whoever, at his period of life, means to go on, 
and to be well, must institute the most rigid and Spartan-like dis- 
cipline as to food. These are the conditions of nature, as plain as 
if they had been drawn up on parchment by a Writer to the Signet 
upon the proper stamp. 

The most sanguine of the Whigs think the next Parliament will 
be much the same as this ; that parties will be as equally balanced. 
This is the opinion of Charles Wood and Lord Duncannon. The 
most sanguine of the Tories think they shall gain fifty votes. I have 
no opinion on the subject. 

It will give me great pleasure, my dear Murray, to see you in 
London next spring ; you have such an extensive acquaintance 
there, that you should keep it up. 

I am staying here with the Hibberts. Nothing can exceed the 
comfort of the place. Happy the father who sees his daughter so 
well placed ! I am very glad the Archbishop of Dublin has given 
something to Shannon, whom I know, from your statements and 
from my own observation, to be a very excellent person. I will 
certainly read his book. Yours, dear Murray, most sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 

462.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey, December ■, 1841. 

It shall be done, dearest G., as soon as I can get some silver 
paper adapted for foreign postages. I believe Lady Davy to be the 
most kind and useful person whose acquaintance can be made at 
Rome. 

You may laugh, dear G., but after all, the country is most dread- 
ful ! The real use of it is to find food for cities ; but as for a resi- 
dence of any man who is neither butcher nor baker, nor food- 
grower in any of its branches, it is a dreadful waste of existence 
and abuse of life. God bless you ! Sydney Smith. 

I called on Miss last time I was in London. The answer 

at the door was, " She was gone from thence, but was to be heard 
of at the Temple." 

463.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey^ Dec. 1841. 
My dear Georgiana, 
It is indeed a great loss * to me j but I have learnt to live as a 
soldier does in war, expecting that, on any one moment, the best 
and the dearest may be killed before his eyes. 

* The death of Lord Holland. 



570 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Promise me, in the midst of these afflicting deaths, that you will 
remain alive; and if Death does tap at the door, say, "I can't 
come ; I have promised a parson to see him out." 

These verses were found in Lord Holland's room in his hand- 
writing ; — 

" Nephew of Fox, and friend of Grey, — 
Enough my meed of fame, 
If those who deign'd to observe me say 
I tarnish'd neither name." 

I have gout, asthma, and seven other maladies, but am other- 
wise very well. God bless you, Gem of Needwood Forest ! 

Sydney Smith. 



464.] To Lady Ashburton. 

Dogmersfield Park, 1 84 1 . 

You have very naturally, my dear Lady Ashburton, referred to 
me for some information respecting St Anthony. The principal 
anecdotes related of him are, that he was rather careless of his 
diet ; and that, instead of confining himself to boiled mutton and a 
little wine and water, he ate of side-dishes, and drank two glasses 
of sherry, and refused to lead a life of great care and circumspec- 
tion, such as his constitution required. The consequence was, that 
his friends were often alarmed at his health ; and the medical men 
of Jerusalem and Jericho were in constant requisition, taking exor- 
bitant fees, and doing him little good. 

You ought to be very thankful to me (Lord Ashburton and your- 
self) for resisting as firmly and honourably as I do, my desire to 
offer myself at the Grange ; but my health is so indifferent, and my 
spirits so low, and I am so old and half-dead, that I am mere lum- 
ber ; so that I can only inflict myself upon the Mildmays, who are 

accustomed to Mr ; and I dare not appear before one who 

crosses the seas to arrange the destinies of nations, and to chain 
up in bonds of peace the angry passions of the people of the 
earth. 

Still I can preach a little ; and I wish you had witnessed, the 
other day, at St Paul's, my incredible boldness in attacking the 
Puseyites. I told them that they made the Christian religion a 
religion of postures and ceremonies, of circumflexions and genu- 
flexions, of garments and vestures, of ostentation and parade ; that 
they took up tithe of mint and cummin, and neglected the weigh- 
tier matters of the law, — justice, mercy, and the duties of life ; and 
so forth. 

Pray give my kind regards to the ambassador of ambassadors ; 
and believe me, my dear Lady Ashburton, with benedictions to the 
whole house, ever sincerely yours, Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 571 

465.] To R. Murchison, Esq. 

Combe Florey, Dec. 26, 1841. 
Dear Murchison, 

Many thanks for your yellow book,* which has just come down to 
me. You have gained great fame, and I am very glad of it. Had 
it been in theology, I should have been your rival, and probably 
have been jealous of you ; but as it is in geology, my benevolence 
and real goodwill towards you have fair play. I shall read you out 
aloud to-day ; Heaven send I may understand you ! Not that I 
suspect your perspicuity, but that my knowledge of your science is 
too slender for that advantage : a knowledge which just enables me 
to distinguish between the caseous and the cretaceous formations ; 
or, as the vulgar have it, to " know chalk from cheese." 

There are no people here, and no events, so I have no news to tell 
you, except that in this mild climate my orange-trees are now out 
of doors, and in full bearing. Immediately before my window there 
are twelve large oranges on one tree. The trees themselves are not 
the Linnasan orange-tree, but what are popularly called the bay-tree, 
in large green boxes of the most correct shape, and the oranges well 
secured to them with the best packthread. They are universally 
admired, and, upon the whole, considered to be finer than the 
Ludovican orange-trees of Versailles. Yours, my dear Murchison, 
Sydney Smith. 

466.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Jan. 10, 1842. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Tell me if you think this sketch is like,t and what important 
feature I have left out or misrepresented. Remember, it is not an 
eloge, but an analysis. 

I heard, when I was in London, that my old correspondent, Arch- 
deacon Singleton, would be the first Tory Bishop. He is a great 
friend of Peel's ; they could not select a better man. 

I pass my life in reading. The moment my eyes fail, I must give 
up my country preferment. I have met with nothing new or very 
well worth meeting, except the curious discoveries of ancient 
American cities in Mexico, by Stephens ; which, I presume, has 
been read at Howick. I am very glad Lord Howick is in Parlia- 
ment : his honesty, ability, and rank make it desirable for the 
country he should be there. 

I hope Lord Grey has read, and likes, Macaulay's review of 

* The yellow book was an inaugural address to the Dudley and Midland Geological 
Society. 

f Enclosed in the above letter was the portrait of Lord Holland, to be found in the 
Memoir, Chapter X. 



572 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Warren Hastings. It is very much admired. I believe he is un- 
affectedly glad to have given up office. Literature is his vocation. 

I shall be very curious to know the impression America produces 
on Lord Morpeth. He is acute, and his opinions always very just. 
It is a fortunate thing for the world, that the separate American 
States are making such progress in dishonesty, and are absolutely 
and plainly refusing to pay their debts. They would soon have 
been too formidable, if they had added the moral power of good 
faith to their physical strength. 

I beg my kind regards to Lord Grey and Lady Georgiana ; and 
remain always, dear Lady Grey, with sincere respect and affection, 
your friend, Sydney Smith. 

467.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe Florey, Feb. 6, 1842. 
My dear Philips, 
I have suffered a great deal this winter from dulness and ennui. 
I am not one of those mortals that have " infinite resources in them- 
selves," but am fitted up with the commonest materials, and require 
to be amused. However, I shall soon be in London, where I will 
take my revenge. Hibbert not being here, I have had no one to 
argue with. The neighbouring clergy never attempt it, or they are 
checkmated the second or third move. Such sort of rumours as 
you allude to are disagreeable, especially to young people, who 
imagine mankind have left off hunting, shooting, and ploughing, 
to speculate upon them. 

Are you not struck with the diplomatic gallantry of Lord Ash- 
burton ? He resembles Regulus. I tell him that the real cause of 
the hostility of America is, that we are more elegant, and speak 
better English than they do. 

The opening of the session was very milk-and-watery. The 

secession of the is a great accession of strength to Peel. 

is, besides his violence, a weak, foolish man. I have met him two 

or three times at Mr 's, and have no doubt that he is anserous 

and asinine. 

I want very much to write something, but cannot bring myself 
to do it, — principally from the great number of topics which offer 
themselves, all of which would be equally agreeable to me. I am 
very glad you have thrown away your last fit of gout. Considering 
your dreadful indulgences in the second course, I think they have 
let you off very easily. Mrs Sydney has certainly taken a new 
lease. She is become less, can walk, and has much more enjoy- 
ment of life. I am very well, asthma expected. God bless you, 
dear Philips ! I remain, your old and sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 573 

468.] To Lord Francis Egerton. 

56 Green Street, Feb. 18, 1842. 
Dear Lord Francis, 

Many thanks for your kindness in sending me the Pilgrimage, 
which I have read with real pleasure ; it is all good, but what 1 
like best is the 53d, and that train of thought followed out in the 
subsequent stanzas. The toil and heat of the journey supported by 
the animation of the religious scenery : this is truly poetical. I 
thought also the end very beautiful. 

I have sent to the press the pamphlet on the Marriage Act, as 
you desired. Ever very truly yours, Sydney Smith. 



469.] To the Countess Grey. 

Green Street, March 16, 1842. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

A most melancholy occurrence, — the death of poor Singleton ! 
So unexpected, and so premature ! He was an excellent specimen 
of an English clergyman, and I most heartily and sincerely regret 
his loss. We shall be very glad to see you here. This is the spot, 
I am convinced, where all the evils of life are soonest forgotten and 
most easily endured. 

I have no news to tell you. We are all talking here of India and 
Income ; the one circumscribed by the Affghans, and the other by 
Peel. The Duke of Norfolk is dead. 

John Grey seems to be a very sensible, pleasing young man. 
His refusal of the living of Sunbury convinces me that he is not 
fond of gudgeon-fishing. I had figured to myself you and Lord 
Grey and myself engaged in that occupation upon the river 
Thames. S. S. 

470] To Charles Dickens, Esq. 

May 14, 1842. 
My dear Dickens, 
I accept your obliging invitation conditionally. If I am invited 
by any man of greater genius than yourself, or one by whose works 
I have been more completely interested, I will repudiate you, and 
dine with the more splendid phenomenon of the two. Ever yours 
sincerely, Sydney Smith. 

471.] To Miss G. Harcourt. 

Green Street, July 7, 1 842. 
Dear Georgiana, 
What a pretty name is Georgiana ! Many people would say, 

* Now the Earl of Ellesmere. 



574 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

what a pretty name Georgiana is! but this would be inelegant; 
and it is more tolerable to be slovenly in dress than in style. Dress 
covers the mortal body, and adorns it. but style is the vehicle of 
the spirit. 

Now, touching our stay with you, dear young lady, you said, 
" Stay longer : one day is not enough ; " and I myself think such 
a sojourning hasty and fugacious. It all comes from my modesty; 
but Mrs Sydney tells me I am endurable for two days, so wc will 
stay with you till Friday morning after breakfast, you and my Lord 
being willing, which I shall suppose you are, unless I hear to the 
contrary. 

I have many other things to say to you, but I postpone them 
till we meet. It is time to put an end to my paper volubility, and 
you know how I always end my letters by telling you (and the 
problems of Euclid are not more true) that I am your affectionate 
friend, Sydney Smith. 



472.] To Miss G. Harcourt. 

Combe Florey, July 16, 1842. 
My dear Georgian a, 

We had a very unpleasant journey home, from the tossing and 
heaving of our own carriage, in which we remained, instead of 
going into one of the great carriage-cottages. The next time we 
shall try the other plan. 

Many thanks for your kindness and hospitality. I was a little 

damaged by that handsome sister of Mrs : such a fine figure, 

and such a beautiful and commanding countenance. I talked 
sensibly for ten minutes, without a single piece of foolishness, — 

just as a rational creature would have done. I liked Miss , 

but she was eclipsed by the new beauty, whom, if I were young and 
free, I think I should pursue even to the tabernacle, out-rank her 
preachers, and become her favourite pulpit-fool. 

Combe Florey looked beautiful, and our parsonage the perfection 
of comfort. I have now put off my chrysalis wings, and assume the 
grub state. You remain, dear Georgiana, a chrysalis all the year 
round, — for there is very little difference between Bishopthorpe 
and Piccadilly, and none between Nuneham and Grosvenor 
Square. 

I have put off all the catalogue of domestic evils till Monday ; — 
sick cows, lame horses, frail females, mischievous boys, and small 
felonies 1 Your sincere and affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith, 



LETTERS OF THE KEV. SYDNEY SMITH. 575 

473.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe Florey y Atig. 16, 1842. 
My dear Philips, 

I am extremely glad to hear that Lady Philips and you are so 
well. Mrs Sydney and I are resolved to follow your example, and 
have been imitating you in this particular for some time. The 
only point in which our practice differs is, that Mrs Sydney and I 
get larger and larger, as we get older ; you and Lady Philips 
become less and less. You will die of smallness, — we shall perish 
from diameter. There has certainly been some serious mistake 
about this summer. It was intended for the tropics ; and some hot 
country is cursed with our cold rainy summer, losing all its cloves 
and nutmegs, scarcely able to ripen a pine-apple out of doors, or to 
squeeze a hogshead of sugar from the cane. 

I agree in all you say about the Income Tax. Never was there 
such an obscure piece of penmanship ! It must have been drawn 

up by some one as ignorant of law language at Dr is of 

medicine. What dreadful blunders that poor Medico will make ! 
Dreadful will be the confusion between the schedules ; worse than 
the confusion of phials by that nasty little boy, Robert Rhubarb, in 
his shop, whom he has taken as his apprentice, at a pound a year 
and his breeches. 

I am a good deal alarmed at the slow return of prosperity to the 
manufacturers, but still do not give up my opinion of amelioration. 
I should like very much to see a dispassionate examination of the 
present state of trade and manufactures. But who is dispassionate 
on such a subject ? The writer has either lost or gained, or is a 
violent Whig or a violent Tory. 

There seems to be some appearance as if Lord Ashburton had 
effected his object. He writes home that he may be expected any 
day, and that they are to write no more ; and the papers say that 
the heads of the treaty are agreed upon. If he have completed his 
object, it is one of the cleverest and most brilliant things done in 
my time, and he has honestly won his earldom. I never had much 
belief in his success, because I did not imagine that the Americans 
ever really intended to give up a cause of quarrel, which might 
hereafter be so subservient to their ambition and extension. God 
bless you, my dear old friend ! Sydney Smith. 



474.] To Lady Wenlock. 

Combe Florey, 1842. 
My dear Lady Wenlock, 
I am heartily sorry for the necessity which takes you to Italy. 
You have many friends, who will be truly anxious for your welfare 



576 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

and happiness ; pray place us on that list. The constant kindness 
and attention 1 have received from Lord Wenlock and yourself 
have bound me over to you, and made me sincerely your friend, 
and your highly obliged friend. I will write you a line now and then, 
if you will permit me, to tell you how the world literary and ecclesi- 
astical is going on. 

Many thanks for the charge, which I will certainly read. If I 
am as much pleased with it as you are, I am sure my pleasure will 
be mingled with no small share of surprise ; for though I think the 

Bishop of a very amiable man, I did not think I should ever 

read with approbation, or indeed read at all, ten pages of his 
writing. 

I beg to be kindly remembered to Miss Lawley, whom Mrs 
Sydney and I have fairly fallen in love with ; so affable, so natural, 
so handsome, — you will never keep her long, for I should think it 
a perfect infamy in any young man of rank and fortune to be three 
days in her company without making her an offer. 

My kindest wishes and earnest benediction for you and yours, 
dear Lady Wenlock, Sydney Smith. 

PS. — The charge is admirable ; I have written to the Bishop 
about it. 

475.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Aug. 26, 1842. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I hope you have survived the heat ; I have done so, but with 
some difficulty. After the heat came the riots. The only differ- 
ence between these and the former manufacturing riots is, that the 
mob have got hold, under the name of Chartism, of some plan for 
political innovation ; but that plan is so foolish, that I do not think 
it will be long-lived. 

If any one bearing the name of Grey comes this way, send him 
to us : I am G?'ey-men-ivorous. God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! 
I will not scold you any more : silent or scribbling, you shall have 
your own way, provided you will believe me to remain your affec* 
tionate friend, Sydney Smith. 

476. J To Lady Davy. 

September 11, 1842. 

My dear Lady Davy, 

There is a demand for you in England, and a general inquiry 

whether you have given us up altogether. I always defend you, 

and say, if you have so done, that it is from no want of love for 

us, but from a rooted dislike of rheumatism, catarrh, and bodily 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. $77 

mal-etre, such as all true Britons undergo for eleven months and 
three weeks in the year. 

What have I to tell you of our old friends ? Lady is toler- 
ably well, with two courses and a French cook. She has fitted up 
her lower rooms in a very pretty style, and there receives the shat- 
tered remains of the symposiasts of the house. Lady has 

captivated Mr , though they have not proceeded to the ex- 
tremities of marriage. Mr is going gently down-hill, trusting 

that the cookery in another planet may be at least as good as in 
this ; but not without apprehensions that for misconduct here he 
may be sentenced to a thousand years of tough mutton, or con- 
demned to a little eternity of family dinners. 

I have not yet discovered of what I am to die, but I rather be- 
lieve I shall be burnt alive by the Puseyites. Nothing so remark- 
able in England as the progress of these foolish people. I have no 
conception what they mean, if it be not to revive every absurd 
ceremony, and every antiquated folly, which the common sense of 
mankind has set to sleep. You will find at your return a fanatical 
Church of England, but pray do not let it prevent your return. 
We can always gather together, in Park Street and Green Street, a 
chosen few who have never bowed the knee to Rimmon. 

Did you meet at Rome my friend Mrs ? Give me, if you 

please, some notion of the impression she produced upon you. 
She is very clever, very good-natured, and good- hearted, but the 
Lilliputians are afraid of her. We shall be truly glad to see you 
again, but I think you will never return. Why should you give up 
your serene heavens and short winters, to re-enter this garret of 
the earth ? Yet there are those in the garret who know how to 
appreciate you, and no one better than your old and sincere 
friend, SYDNEY SMITH. 

477.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Carlisle, 

I have just sent a long letter to the brother of Francis Horner, 
which he is to publish in his Memoir of my old friend. I had 
great pleasure in writing it. You and Lord Carlisle will, I am 
sure, justify all the good I have said of him. 

Even Archbishops of Canterbury must die. Archbishops of 
York seem to be the only persons exempt. I wonder who will 
succeed. It is of great importance that Archbishops should be 
tall. They ought not to take them under six feet, without their 
shoes or wigs. Lord Liverpool meant to elevate Kaye, the Bishop 
of Lincoln, if the see of Canterbury had become vacant in his time ; 
but the Church would not last twenty years with such a little man. 

2 



5/8 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

I hope you arc well and happy, dear Lady Carlisle, and that 
every Victoria's head that reaches Castle Howard brings you 
pleasing intelligence of sons, daughters, and grandchildren. 

Sydney Smith. 

478.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 12, 1842. 
My dear Murray, 

How did the Queen receive you ? What was the general effect 
of her visit ? Was it well managed? Does she show any turn for 
metaphysics ? Have you had much company in the Highlands ? 

Mrs Sydney and I are both in fair health, — such health as is 
conceded to moribundity and caducity. 

Horner applied to me, and I sent him a long letter upon the 
subject of his brother, which he likes, and means to publish in 
his Memoirs. He seeks the same contribution from Jeffrey. Pray 
say to Jeffrey that he ought to send it. It is a great pity that the 
subject has been so long deferred. The mischief has all pro- 
ceeded from the delays of poor Whishaw, who cared too much 
about reputation, to do anything in a period compatible with the 
shortness of human life. If you have seen Jeffrey, tell me how he 
is, and if you think he will stand his work. 

We have the railroad now within five miles. Bath in two hours, 
London in six, — in short, everywhere in no time ! Every fresh 
accident on the railroads is an advantage, and leads to an improve- 
ment. What we want is, an overturn which would kill a bishop, or, 
at least, a dean. This mode of conveyance would then become 
perfect. We have had but little company here this summer. 
Luttrell comes next week. I have given notice to the fishmongers, 
and poulterers, and fruit women ! Ever, dear Murray, your 
sincere friend, Sydney Smith. 

479.] To Sir George Philips. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 13, 1842. 
My dear Philips, 

I have no belief at all in the general decay of English manufac- 
tures ; and I believe before Christmas the infernal regions of 
Manchester will be in an uproar of manufacturing activity. I have 
made my return of income, but I have done it by the light of 
nature, unassisted by the Act. They should not put such men as 

Dr W to interpret difficult Acts. Your friend Rolfe is always 

liked by the Bar. He gives universal satisfaction. 

I hear that Lady Philips is a good deal alarmed at the idea of 
Vigne, the traveller in Caboul, being a Mahometan. I have no 
belief that he is so ; but you had better inquire of Dr Wright 
about it, and that will put the clergyman of the parish at his ease. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 579 

It seems quite useless to kill the Chinese. It is like killing flies 
in July ; a practice which tires the crudest schoolboy. I really do 
not know what is to be done, unless to send Napier, who, for a sum 
of money, would dethrone the Emperor, and bring him here. You 
should read Napier's two little volumes of the war in Portugal. He 
is an heroic fellow, equal to anything in Plutarch ; and, moreover, 
a long-headed, clever hero, who takes good aim before he fires. I 
had a letter yesterday from Howick. They are all expecting in 
Northumberland that the Queen will return by land. 

I hope you have given up riding, and yielded to the alarms of 
your friends. Indeed, my dear old friend, it is perilous to see you 
on horseback. If you had ever the elements of that art, there might 
be some hope, but you know I never could succeed in teaching you, 
either by example or precept. Ever, my dear Philips, most sincerely 
yours, Sydney Smith. 



480.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 13, 1842. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I am sorry to hear Allen is not well ; but the reduction of his 
legs is a pure and unmixed good ; they are enormous, — they are 
clerical ! He has the creed of a philosopher and the legs of a 
clergyman ; I never saw such legs, — at least, belonging to a lay- 
man. 

Read " A Life in the Forest," skipping nimbly ; but there is much 
of good in it. 

It is a bore, I admit, to be past seventy, for you are left for 
execution, and are daily expecting the death-warrant ; but, as you 
say, it is not anything very capital we quit. We are, at the close 
of life, only hurried away from stomach-aches, pains in the joints, 
from sleepless nights and unamusing days, from weakness, ugliness, 
and nervous tremors ; but we shall all meet again in another planet, 

cured of all our defects. will be less irritable ; more 

silent ; will assent ; Jeffrey will speak slower ; Bobus will be 

just as he is ; I shall be more respectful to the upper clergy ; but 
I shall have as lively a sense as I now have of all your kindness 
and affection for me. Sydney Smith. 



481.] To Mrs Meynell. 

Combe Florey, Sept 13, 1842. 
Dearest Gee, 
Nothing could exceed the beauty of the grapes, except the beauty 
of the pine-aple. How well you understand the clergy ! 

I am living, lively and young as I am, in the most profound 
solitude. I saw a crow yesterday, and had a distant view of a 



S8o LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

rabbit to-day. I have ceased to trouble myself about company. 
If anybody thinks it worth while to turn aside to the Valley of 
Flowers, I am most happy to see them ; but I have ceased to lay 
plots, and to toil for visitors. I save myself by this much dis- 
appointment. Sydney Smith. 

482.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 19, 1842. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Thank God, this fine summer, which you so admire, is over ! 
I have suffered dreadfully from it. I was only half-alive, and could 
with difficulty keep all my limbs together, and make them perform 
their proper functions. 

You wrote me a very kind letter : I am very much obliged to 
you for it. I am very proud of the friendship of yourself and Lord 
Grey, and value myself more, because you set some value upon me. 
Luttrell is staying here ; he is remarkably well, considering that he 
has been remarkably well for so many years. You never seem 
tired of Howick, or if you are, you do not confess it. I am more 
unfortunate or more honest. I tire of Coinbe Florey after two 
months, and sigh for a change, even for the worse. This disposi- 
tion in me is hereditary ; my father lived, within my recollection, 
in nineteen different places. 

Lord Ashburton seems to have done very well. The treaty can 
hardly be a bad one ; any concession was better than war. He 
owes his success, not more to his own dexterity, than to the present 
poverty and distress of America. They are in a state of humilia- 
tion. The State of Pennsylvania cheats me this year out of ^50. 
There is nothing in the crimes of kings worse than this villany of 
democracy. The mob positively refuse all taxation for the pay- 
ment of State debts. 

I have heard from several London people the details of 

. It is among the most remarkable events of my time, and 

very frightful. I never longed to steal anything but some manu- 
script sermons from my brother clergymen, and I have hitherto 
withstood the temptation. Sydney Smith. 

483.] To Lord Denman. 

Combe Florey, October, 1842. 
My dear Lord, 
I have received your speech upon affirmations ; and though it is 
not said so on the white leaf, I believe you sent it to me : if not, 
leave me in the honourable delusion. 

Your great difficulty in arguing such a question is akin to that 
cf proving that two and two are equivalent to four. All that the 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 581 

Legislature ought to inquire is, whether this scruple is now become 
so common as to cause the frequent interruption of justice. This 
admitted, the remedy ought to follow as a matter of course. We 
are to get the best evidence for establishing truth, — not the best 
evidence we can imagine, but the best evidence we can procure ; 
and if you cannot get oath, you must put up with affirmation, as 
far better than no evidence at all. But one is ashamed to descant 
upon such obvious truths. 

One obvious truth, however, I have always great pleasure in 
descanting upon ; and that is, that I always see the Chief Justice 
leading the way in everything that is brave, liberal, and wise ; and 
I beg he will accept my best wishes and kind regards. 

Sydney Smith. 

484.] To Mrs . 

Combe Florey, Oct. 13, 1842. 
My dear Mrs , 

You lie heavy upon my conscience, unaccustomed to bear any 
weight at all. What can a country parson say to a travelled and 
travelling lady, who neither knows nor cares anything for wheat, 
oats, and barley ? It is this reflection which keeps me silent. Still 
she has a fine heart, and likes to be cared for, even by me. 

Mrs Sydney and I are in tolerable health, — both better than we 
were when you lived in England ; but there is much more of us, so 
that you will find you were only half acquainted with us ! I wish 
I could add that the intellectual faculties had expanded in propor- 
tion to the augmentation of flesh and blood. 

Have you any chance of coming home ? or rather, I should say, 
have we any chance of seeing you at home ? I have been living for 
three months quite alone here. I am nearly seventy-two, and I 
confess myself afraid of the very disagreeable methods by which we 
leave this world; the long death of palsy, or the degraded spectacle 
of aged idiotism. As for the pleasures of the world, — it is a very 
ordinary, middling sort of place. Pray be my tombstone, and say 
a good word for me when I am dead ! I shall think of my beautiful 
monument when I am going; but I wish I could see it before I die. 
God bless you ! Sydney Smith. 

485.] To the Countess Grey. 

Greeji Street, November, 1842. 
There are plenty of people in London, dear Lady Grey, as there 
always are. I am leading a life almost as riotous as in the middle 
of June. Have you read Macaulay's " Lays " ? They are very 
much liked. I have read some of them, but I abhor all Grecian 
and Roman subjects. 



582 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

There are no Whigs to be seen. There are descriptions of them ; 
but they are a lost variety of the species, like the dodo or sea-cow. 

I am just recovered from a fit of the gout, but am quite well, — 
enjoying life, and ready for death ! 

Kind regards to my Lord, and to Georgiana, the honest and the 
true ; and much affection from your old friend, Sydney Smith. 



486.] To Lady Holland. 

November 6, 1842. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I have not the heart, when an amiable lady says, " Come to 
' Semiramis ' in my box," to decline ; but I got bolder at a distance. 
"Semiramis" would be to me pure misery. I love music very 
little, — I hate acting ; I have the worst opinion of Semiramis her- 
self, and the whole thing (I cannot help it) seems so childish and 
so foolish that I cannot abide it. Moreover, it would be ratner out 
of etiquette for a Canon of St Paul's to go to an opera ; and where 
etiquette prevents me from doing things disagreeable to myself, I 
am a perfect martinet. 

All these things considered, I am sure you will not be a Semira- 
mis to me, but let me off. Sydney Smith. 



487.] To Miss Berry. 

November, 1842. 

Where is Tittenkanger? 

Is it near Bangor? 

Is it in Scotland, 

Or a more flat land ? 

Is it in Wales, 

Or near Versailles ? 

Tell me, in the name of grace, 

Why you go to such a place 1 

I do not know in what map to look, 

And I can't find it in the Road-book. 

I always feel so sad and undone, 

When you and Agnes go from London. 

Your loving friend and plump divine 

Accepts your kind commands to dine. 

I will be certain to remember 

The fifteenth day of this November. 

There is a young Prince 

Two days since 

But for fear I should be a bore, 
I won't write you any more ; 
Indeed I 've nothing else to tell, 
But that Monckton Millies is well. 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 583 

488.] To Lady Bell. 

56 Green Street, Grosvenor Square, Nov. 26, 1842. 
My dear Lady Bell, 
What has a clergyman to offer but sermons ? 
Look over this,* and if you like it, copy it, and return it here 
before the 6th of December. They are common arguments, but I 
know no other; — and attribute what I send not to vanity, but 
kindness, — for your state affected me very much. I will call upon 
you very soon. Ever yours, Sydney Smith. 



489.] To Mrs Holland. 

Combe Florey, December, 1842. 
My dear Saba, 
Your three eldest children will each receive a copy t from me. 
I had intended to send them before your letter came ; therefore 
submit with a good grace, and do not oppose your papa. Ever 
your affectionate father, Sydney Smith. 

490.] To the Countess Grey. 

December 21, 1842. 
Dear Lady Grey, 

I am quite delighted with the railroad. I came down in the 
public carriages without any fatigue, and I could have gone to the 
poles or the equator without stopping. Distance is abolished, — 
scratch that out of the catalogue of human evils. 

Luckily, serious quarrels have broken out here, and everybody 
is challenging everybody. This is something to talk about. I 
study the question deeply, whether the Clerk of the Peace is to 
fight a certain captain whose name is Mars. These quarrels pro- 
duce a wholesome agitation of the air, and disturb the serious 
apoplexy of a country life. 

I have just read young Philips's review of Alison, and think it 
very good. It is well expressed, and the censure is conveyed in a 
much more gentle manner than characterises the Edinburgh 
Review, or than did characterise it, when I had anything to do with 
it. I am not sure that it is not every now and then languid and 
feeble, and certainly it has the universal fault of being a great 
deal too long. What is required in a review ? As much know- 
ledge and information upon any one subject as can be condensed 
into eight or ten pages. You must not bring me a loaf when I ask 
for a crust, or a joint of meat when I petition for a sandwich. 

* This Sermon was published after Mr Sydney Smith's death. " Wc are perplexed, 
but not in despair," &c. 
t Of the writer's Works. 



5?4 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

The weather is here, as it seems to be everywhere, perfectly de- 
lightful. Even in Scotland they pretend it is fine ; but they are 
not to be believed on their oath, where the climate of Scotland is 
concerned. 

Did you ever read " Le Pere Goriot," by Balzac, or " La Messe 
de l'Athee " ? They are very good, and perfectly readable for ladies 
and gentlemen. Your affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 



491.] To Charles Dickens, Esq. 

January 6, 1843. 
My dear Sir, 
You have been so used to these sort of impertinences, that I 
believe you will excuse me for saying how very much I am pleased 
with the first number of your new work. Pecksniff and his daugh- 
ters, and Pinch, are admirable, — quite first-rate painting, such as 
no one but yourself can execute. 

I did not like your genealogy of the Chuzzlewits, and I must wait 
a little to see how Martin turns out ; I am impatient for the next 
number. 

Pray come and see me next summer ; and believe me ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — Chuffey is admirable. I never read a finer piece of writ- 
ing ; it is deeply pathetic and affecting. Your last number is ex- 
cellent. Don't give yourself the trouble to answer my impertinent 
eulogies, only excuse them. Ever yours, S. S. 



492.] To Lady Holland. 

Combe Elorey, Jan. 16, 1843. 
My dear Lady Holland, 

I exempt you from a regular and punctual system of answers to 
my nonsense. I find it almost impossible to read your handwrit- 
ing ; but knowing it always contains some proffer of kindness and 
hospitality to me, I answer upon general principles and conjec- 
ture. 

Have you any objection to take a few lessons of writing from me 
in my morning calls ? I could bring you on very much in the course 
of next summer ; and if you take pains, I will show your book to 
Lady Cowper. I behaved very generously to Bobus in letting him 
off from coming here ; he promises to come next summer, but such 
is my good-nature, that I think he will try to escape. Bowood is, 
I believe, his only exception to the love of solitude. 

We are in a snow-storm ; but with a warm house and noisy 






LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 585 

grandchildren, I defy the weather. I wish for nothing out of the 
house but the continuance of your kindness and affection. 

Sydney Smith. 



493.] To Miss Berry. 

Combe Ftorey, Jan. 28, 1843. 

Are you well ? Answer me that, and I am answered. I question 
everybody who comes from Curzon Street, and the answers I get 
are so various, that I must look into the matter myself. Who comes 
to see you ? or rather, who does not come to see you ? Who are 
the wise, the fair, the witty, who absent themselves from your parties, 
and still preserve their character for beauty, for wisdom, and for 
wit? I have been hybernating in my den, but begin to scent the 
approach of Spring, and to hear the hum of the metropolis, propos- 
ing to be there the 22d of February. 

Poor ! the model of all human prosperity ! He seems to 

have been killed, as an animal is killed, for his plumpness. What 
other motive could there be ? Or was it to liberate him from the 

? to terminate the frigid friendship, and to guard the from 

that heavy pleasantry with which, in moments of relaxation, 

is apt to overwhelm his dependants ? I say, moments of relaxation ; 
because this unbending posture of mind is never observed in him 
for more than a few seconds. 

Mankind looked on with critical curiosity when Lady Holland 
dined with you ; only general results reached me here ; it would 
have been conducted, I am sure, with the greatest learning and skill 
on both sides. Ah ! if Providence would but give us more Boswells ! 
But your house deserves a private Boswell ; think of one. Whom 
will you choose ? I am too old, and too absent, — absent, I mean, 
in body. 

I am studying the death of Louis XVI. Did he die heroically ? 
or did he struggle on the scaffold ? Was that struggle (for I believe 
there was one) for permission to speak? or from indignation at not 
being suffered to act for himself at the last moment, and to place 
himself under the axe ? Make this out for me, if you please, and 
speak of it to me when I come to London. I don't believe the Abbe* 
Edgeworth's " Son of St Louis, montez au ciel /" It seems neces- 
sary that great people should die with some sonorous and quotable 
saying. Mr Pitt said something not intelligible in his last moments : 
G. Rose made it out to be, " Save my country, Heaven ! " The 
nurse, on being interrogated, said that he asked for barley-water. 

I have seen nobody since I saw you, but persons in orders. My 
only varieties are vicars, rectors, curates, and every now and then 
(byway of turbot) an archdeacon. There is nobody in the country 



586 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

but parsons. Remember, you gave me your honour and word that 
I should find you both in good health in February. Upon the faith 
of this promise I gave, and now give, you, my benediction. 

Sydney Smith. 

494.] To the Countess Grey. 

Green Street, Feb. 28, 1843. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
Bulteel has stated his case to me, and I have given him my ad- 
vice upon it. Has a bishop a right to make a condition of ordin- 
ation, that which the law does not make a condition, — that no man 
shall be ordained who has not taken an English degree ? Suppose 
he were to say that no man should be ordained who travels on the 
continent, or who has studied the Italian language, or who is not 
six feet high. Where does power end ? How does he prove that 
the tutor knew this rule ? What right has he to say, that a man 
(even knowing it) may not go to be ordained when he chooses ? — 
and fifty other questions to which the case gives birth. 

Sydney Smith. 

495.] To Roderick Murchison, Esq. 

Green Street, March 10, 1843. 
Dear Murchison, 
Many thanks for your address, which I will diligently read. May 
there not be some one among the infinite worlds where men and 
women are all made of stone ? Perhaps of Parian marble ? How 
infinitely superior to flesh and blood ! What a Paradise for you, 
to pass eternity with a greywacke woman ! Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

P.S. — Very good indeed ! The model of an address from a 
scientific man to practical men ! Great zeal, and an earnest desire 
to make others zealous. 

The style and language just what they ought to be. No lapses, 
no indiscretions. The only expression I quarrel with is monograph j 
either it has some conventional meaning among geologists, or it 
only means a pamphlet, — a book. 



496.] To Miss G. Harcourt. 

Green Street, March 29, 1843. 
My dear Georgiana, 
Was there ever such stupid trash as these humorous songs ? If 
there is anything on earth makes me melancholy, it is a humorous 

song. Still I glory in the Widow E , and am infinitely pleased 

with her good sense and the gentleness of her nature. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 587 

I did not think you were recovered at Mr Grenville's, but I thought 
you better at Belgrave Square. I took a medical survey of you, 
unobserved by you. 

Always, dear Georgiana, your affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

Note to Miss G. Harcourt. 

My dear G., 

The pain in my knee 

Would not sufter me 

To drink your bohea. 

I can laugh and talk, 

But I cannot walk ; 

And I thought his Grace would stare 

If I put my leg on a chair. 

And to give the knee its former power, 

It must be fomented for half an hour ; 

And in this very disagreeable state, 

If I had come at all, I should have been too late. 



497.] To Dr Whewell. 

April 8, 1843. 
My dear Sir, 

My lectures are gone to the dogs, and are utterly forgotten I 
knew nothing of moral philosophy, but I was thoroughly aware 
that I wanted ,£200 to furnish my house. The success, however, 
was prodigious ; all Albemarle Street blocked up with carriages, 
and such an uproar as I never remember to have been excited by 
any other literary imposture. Every week I had a new theory 
about conception and perception ; and supported by a natural 
manner, a torrent of words, and an impudence scarcely credible in 
this prudent age. Still, in justice to myself, I must say there were 
some good things in them. But good and bad are all gone. By 
" moral philosophy" you mean, as they mean at Edinburgh, mental 
philosophy ; i.e., the faculties of the mind, and the effects which 
our reasoning powers and our passions produce upon the actions 
of our lives. 

I think the University uses you and us very ill, in keeping you 
so strictly at Cambridge. If Jupiter could desert Olympus for 
twelve days to feast with the harmless Ethiopians, why may not 
the Vice- Chancellor commit the graduating, matriculating world 
for a little time to the inferior deities, and thunder and lighten at 
the tables of the metropolis ? 

I hope you like Horner's " Life." It succeeds extremely well 
here. It is full of all the exorbitant and impracticable views so 
natural to very young men at Edinburgh ; but there is great order, 



588 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

great love of knowledge, high principle and feelings, which ought 
to grow and thrive in superior minds. 

Our kind regards to Mrs Whewell. Ever, my dear Sir, sincerely 
yours, Sydney Smith. 

498. To Roderick Murchison, Esq. 

Green Street, April 2% 1843. 

I am very much obliged to you for your book, which I shall 
read, though I shall not understand it ; not from your want of 
light, but from my want of vision. I rejoice in your reputation ; I 
know your industry and enterprise, and am always truly yours, 
Sydney Smith. 

499.] To Miss Berry. 

June. 
Dear Berries, 

I dine on Saturday with the good Widow T , and blush to 

say that I have no disposable day before the 26th ; by which time 
you will, I presume, be plucking gooseberries in the suburban 
regions of Richmond. But think not, O Berries ! that that 
distance, or any other, of latitude or longitude, shall prevent me 
from following you, plucking you, and eating you. Whatever 
pleasure men find in the raspberry, in the strawberry, in the 
coffee-berry, all these pleasures are to my taste concentrated in 
the May-Fair Berries. Ever theirs, Sydney Smith. 



500.] To John Murray, Esq. 

Green Street, June 4, 1843. 
My dear Murray, 

I should be glad to hear something of your life and adventures, 
and the more particularly so, as I learn you have no intention of 
leaving Edinburgh for London this season. 

Mrs Sydney and I have been remarkably well, and are so at 
present ; why, I cannot tell. I am getting very old in years, but do 
not feel that I am become so in constitution. My locomotive powers 
at seventy-three are abridged, but my animal spirits do not desert 
me. I am become rich. My youngest brother died suddenly, leav- 
ing behind him ,£ 100,000 and no will. A third of this therefore fell 
to my share, and puts me at my ease for my few remaining years. 
After buying into the Consols and the Reduced, I read Seneca '"On 
the Contempt of Wealth ! " What intolerable nonsense ! I heard 
your iloge from Lord Lansdowne when I dined with him, and I 
need not say how heartily I concurred in it. Next to me sat Lord 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 589 

Worsley, whose enclosed letter affected me, and very much pleased 
me, I answered it with sincere warmth. Pray return me the 
paper. Did you read my American Petition, and did you ap- 
prove it ? 

Why don't they talk over the virtues and excellencies of Lans- 
downe ? There is no man who performs the duties of life better, or 
fills a high station in a more becoming manner. He is full of 
knowledge, and eager for its acquisition. His remarkable polite- 
ness is the result of good-nature, regulated by good sense. He 
looks for talents and qualities among all ranks of men, and adds 
them to his stock of society, as a botanist does his plants ; and 
while other aristocrats are yawning among Stars and Garters, 
Lansdowne is refreshing his soul with the fancy and genius which 
he has found in odd places, and gathered to the marbles and pic- 
tures of his palace. Then he is an honest politician, a wise states- 
man, and has a philosophic mind ; he is very agreeable in conversa- 
tion, and is a man of an unblemished life. I shall take care of him 
in my Memoirs ! 

Remember me very kindly to the maximus miniums* and to the 
Scotch Church. I have urged my friend the Bishop of Durham to 
prepare kettles of soup for the seceders, who will probably be 
wandering in troops over our northern counties. Ever your sincere 
friend, Sydney Smith. 

501.] To Charles Dickens, Esq. 

56 Green Street, July 1, 1843. 
Dear Dickens, 
Excellent ! nothing can be better ! You must settle it with the 
Americans as you can, but I have nothing to do with that. I have 
only to certify that the number is full of wit, humour, and power of 
description. 

I am slowly recovering from an attack of gout in the knee, and 
am very sorry to have missed you. Sydney Smith. 



502.] To Lord Mahon. 

July 4, 1843. 
My dear Lord Mahon, 
I am only half recovered from a violent attack of gout in the 
knee, and I could not bear the confinement of dinner, without get- 
ing up and walking between the courses, or thrusting my foot on 
somebody else's chair, like the Archbishop of Dublin. For these 
reasons, I have been forced for some time, and am still forced, to 

• Lord Jeffrey. 



590 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

decline dinner engagements. I should, in a sounder state, have 
had great pleasure in accepting the very agreeable party you are 
kind enough to propose to me ; but I shall avail myself, in the next 
campaign, of your kindness. I consider myself as well acquainted 
with Lady Mahon and yourself, and shall hope to see you here, as 
well as elsewhere. Pray present my benediction to your charming 
wife, who I am sure would bring any plant in the garden into full 
flower by looking at it, and smiling upon it. Try the experiment 
from mere curiosity. Ever yours, Sydney Smith. 



503.] To Mrs Grote. 

Combe Florey, July 17, 1843. 

I have been sadly tormented with the gout in my knee. I had 
made great progress ; but at the Archbishop's I walked too much, 
and the gout came back. 

My place looks very beautiful, and I really enjoy the change. 
We were very sorry not to see you the evening you were to come 
to us ; but the temptation not to come, where you have engaged to 
come, is more than you can resist : try refusing, and see what that 
will do ! Mr Grote was very agreeable and sensible, as he always 
is. I met Brunei at the Archbishop's, and found him a very lively 
and intelligent man. He said that when he coughed up the piece 
of gold, the two surgeons, the apothecary, and physician all joined 
hands, and danced round the room for ten minutes, without taking 
the least notice of his convulsed and half-strangled state. I admire 
this very much. Your sincere friend, Sydney Smith. 



504.] To His Grace the Archbishop of York. 

Combe Florey, July 20, 1843. 
Monseigneur, 

I have taken the liberty to send your Grace the half of a Cheddar 
cheese. It is directed to you, at Nuneham Steventon. You will 
be glad to hear my knee is better a good deal. I have written two 

letters to the Reverend Leibnitz Newton Lavoisier W H , 

to know when he means to come here, and can get no answer. 
There must be something wrong at the Poles or the Equator, or in 
the Milky Way. Pray jog him. 

I am learning to sing some of Moore's songs, which I think I 
shall do to -great perfection. I found here everything very comfort- 
able and very beautiful ; as I left everything, though in a very 
superior degree, at Nuneham. 

I beg my kind regards to dear Georgiana, and remain, my dear 
Lord, with affection and respect, always yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 591 

505.] To Mrs Meynf.ll. 

Combe Florcy. 1843. 
My dear Mrs Meynell, 

Let me, if you please, have a word or two from you, to tell me of 
your new habitation. Saba seems to have been delighted with her 

visit. I see has been with you. How did you like her ? To 

me she is agreeable, civil, and elegant, and by no means insipid. 
She has a kind of ready-money smile, and .a three-per-cent. 
affability, which make her interesting. 

We have been leading a very solitary life here. Hardly a soul 
has been here, but I am contented, as I value more every day the 
pleasures of indolence ; and there is this difference between a large 
inn like Temple Newsam and a small public-house like Combe 
Florey, that you hold a numerous society, who make themselves to 
a certain degree independent of you, and do not weigh upon you ; 
whereas, as I hold only two or three, the social weight is upon me. 
Luttrell is staying here. Nothing can exceed the innocence of our 
conversation. It is one continued eulogy upon man-and-woman- 
kind. You would suppose that two Arcadian old gentlemen, after 
shearing their flocks, had agreed to spend a week together upon 
curds and cream, and to indulge in gentleness of speech and soft- 
ness of mind. 

We have had a superb summer, but I am glad it is over ; I am 
never happy till the fires are lighted. Where is your house in 
London ? You cannot but buy one : it is absolutely impossible for 
Temple Newsam not to have a London establishment. God bless 
you, dear G. ! Keep a little love for your old friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

506.] To Sir George Philips, Bart. 

56 Green Street, Aug. 19, 1843. 
My dear Philips, 

I still believe in the return of business to Manchester, because I 
believe in the efficiency of capital, coals, and priority of skill, and 
cannot think that these advantages can be so soon eclipsed. How 
can the cotton trade be lessened, if the import of the raw article 
continues every three years to increase ? If the demand remains 
the same, or nearly the same, and a mill, from the improvements of 
machinery, can do three times the work it used to do, of course two- 
thirds of the mills must be put down ; and this apparent stagnation 
is considered a proof of the diminution of the trade, whereas it is 
evidence of its healthy state and its increase. 

We have had little Tommy Moore here, who seemed very much 
pleased with his visit. Mrs Holland and her five children are here. 



592 LETTERS OE THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

I cannot make out the Spanish revolution. I thought Espartero 
honest, brave, and to be well understood and esteemed by the 
Spanish people; but they all rise up with one accord, and kick him 
into that refuge of expelled monarchs— a British man-of-war. 

I think the Conservatives begin to feel that Sir Robert Peel is a 
little damaged ; still I should be sorry to see him out : he knows 
how to disguise liberal ideas, and to make them less terrible to the 
Foolery of a country. The Whigs delight to shock and affront, 
and to make their enemies ashamed that such a measure has not 
been carried out before. I am glad your journey is about to be 
shortened to London : the rail has been invaluable here, — it has 
brought us within fifty miles of London. The danger is of becom- 
ing, from our proximity to the railroad, too much in fashion ; but I 
have a steady confidence in my own bad qualities. Your sincere 
friend, Sydney Smith. 



507.] To Mrs Grote. 

Combe Fiorey, Aug. 31, 1843. 
My dear Mrs Grote, 

We shall be extremely glad to see Grote and you. I have not 
received the " Morning Post" you sent me, but I perceive, in other 
papers, my squib has burst, and caused some consternation. 

I find I am getting old, and that my bodily feelings agree very 
well with the parish register. You seem to have had a very amus- 
ing life, with singing and dancing ; but you cannot excite my envy 
by all the descriptions of your dramas and melodramas ; you may 
as well paint the luxuries of barley-meal to a tiger, or turn a leopard 
into a field of clover. All this class of pleasures inspires me with 
the same nausea as I feel at the sight of rich plum-cake or sweat- 
meats ; I prefer the driest bread of common life. I am in no 
degree answering your taste, but stating my own. 

I wish Mrs would make us a visit here ; she is so good- 
natured and amiable, that we should be really very glad to see her. 

In coming here, you come to old age, and stupidity connected 
with old age : I have no recommendation to offer you, but a beauti- 
ful country and an affectionate welcome. 

Peel seems to be a little damaged ; it may be that Ireland can- 
not be governed by Tories. Three-fourths of the quarrels of 
England seem to be about Established Churches. Dr Holland is 
just come from Ireland with a diminished sense of the danger of the 
Repeal cry. My house is, as I tell my daughter, as full of Hollands 
as a gin-shop. 

I have a letter from Ticknor, of Boston, who thinks the Penn- 
sylvanians will pay ; but I tell him when once a people have tasted 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 593 

the luxury of not paying their debts, it is impossible to bring them 
back to the black broth of honesty. Yours, Sydney Smith. 

P.S.— The " Morning Post" is arrived. The author of the letter 
is Ticknor, Professor at Boston ; it is honourable to me ; but he 
magnifies my literary gains, and I much doubt if I have ever 
gained ,£1500 by my literary labours in the course of my life. 



508.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 3, 1843. 

Don't attempt to teach Sir the Northumberland 

method of farming. He cares for nothing but Piccadilly and the 

hospitals and Lady , and is miserable out of London. In coming 

home last week from a dinner-party, our carriage was stopped ; and 
as I was preparing my watch and money, a man put his head into 
the window, and said, "We want Dr Holland." They took him 
out, and we have heard nothing of him since ; we think of adver- 
tising. 

1 am thinking of going for a week or ten days to Ilfracombe. 
My only difficulty is to find out whether I like to go. I am very 
fond of a short visit to the sea, but the comforts of home become 
every day more important to old people ; a bad bed, a cold room, 
a smoky grate, — these are the prices always paid for excursions. 
Ever affectionately yours, Sydney Smith. 



509.] To Lady Dufferin. 

Combe Florey : no date* 
I am just beginning to get well from that fit of gout, at the be- 
ginning of which you were charitable enough to pay me a visit, and 
I said — the same Providence which inflicts gout creates Dufiferins ! 
We must take the good and the evils of life. 

I am charmed, I confess, with the beauty of this country. I 
hope some day you will be charmed with it too. It banished, 
however, every Arcadian notion to see walk in at the gate to- 
day. I seemed to be transported instantly to Piccadilly, and the 
innocence went out of me. 

I hope the process of furnishing goes on well. Attend, I pray 
you, to the proper selection of an easy chair, where you may cast 
yourself down in the weariness and distresses of life, with the abso- 
lute certainty that every joint of the human frame will receive all 
the comfort which can be derived from easy position and soft 
materials ; then the glass, on which your eyes are so often fixed, 
knowing that you have the great duty imposed on the Sheridans, 

2 P 



594 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

of looking well. You may depend upon it, happiness depends 
mainly on these little things. 

I hope you remain in perfect favour with Rogers, and that you are 
not admitted in any of the dress breakfast-parties. Remember me 
to the Norton : tell her I am glad to be sheltered from her beauty by 
the insensibility of age ; that I shall not live to see its decay, but 
die with that unfaded image before my eyes : but don't make a 

mistake, and deliver the message to , instead of your sister. I 

remain, dear Lady Dufferin, very sincerely yours, 

Sydney Smith. 
An Enclosure. 

September 22. 

I am very much mortified that Lady Dufferin does not answer 
my letter. She has gone to Germany — she is sick — she has mar- 
ried Rogers — she ... In short, all sorts of melancholy explana- 
tions came across me, till I found that the probable reason of her 
not answering my letter was, that she had not received it. I was 
strengthened in this belief from finding in my writing-desk the 
letter itself, which was written a month ago, and I conceived it to 
have been despatched the same day. I can write nothing better, 
for I can only repeat my admiration and regard. 

Sydney Smith. 

510.] To Miss Berry. 

Combe Florey : supposed 1843. 

I am reading again Madame du Deffand. God forbid I should 
be as much in love with anybody (yourself excepted) as the poor 
woman was with Horace Walpole ! Did I ever write to you before 
on this paper ? It is called in the shops criminal blush demy. 
There is an ifinocent blush demy, which is cheaper. 

I see some serious evil has befallen Ferguson of Raith. I lament 
it for your sake and for the general good, as he is an excellent 
person. 

The smell of war is not over. I lament, and can conceive no 
greater misery. Among other evils, everybody must be ready for 
fighting ; and I am not ready, but much the contrary. I am ten 
miles from the coast ; a French steamer arrives in the night, and 
the first thing I hear in the morning is that the cushions of my 
pulpit are taken away, and my curate and churchwardens carried 
into captivity. 

I was sorry to be forced to give such a beating, but he was 

very saucy and deserved it ; however, now the battle is over, and I 
hope to live in good humour with all the world for the. rest of my 
life, and to bury the war hatchet. I am glad to hear such excellent 
accounts of your health. Live as long as you can ; nobody will be 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 595 

more missed. Give my love, if you please, to Agnes and Lady 
Charlotte. If you return, all of you, in good health to London, I 
will speak to Milnes, and have a poem written in praise of Rich- 
mond. Sydney Smith. 

511.] To the Countess Grey. 

1843. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

How is Lord Grey going on ? I conjecture that what I read in 
the papers is true, and that your patient has really benefited by the 
gout, for such is the common order or sequence of medical events. 

Suppose O'Connell to have used language violently seditious, 
that there is clear proof of it, and that it is possible to obtain any- 
thing like a fair trial, I think the Ministers have acted properly. 
The question is worth a battle or two : and, if the battle is to be 
fought (I mean the physical battle), it had better be at the time we 
choose, rather than at the time he chooses. We have no foreign 
war now ; there is a good harvest, and an improving trade. I don't 
think it a bad time for taking O'Connell by the beard, and then, the 
next Parliament, pay the Catholic clergy. 

My prediction is, that Peel will be driven out by the concessions 
to be made to Ireland, and that it will fall to Lord John to destroy 
the absurd Protestant Church in that kingdom. It will hardly do 
to pay the priests ; the thing is gone beyond that now. You must 
remove the flockless pastors, or the paymerit of the priesthood will 
be useless. 

I think the Duke quite wrong about the sites for the new churches. 
I should feel very disaffected against inequality of possession, if I 
could not get a place for my altar. I am almost for compelling the 
landed possessor, under the verdict of an appraising jury, to sell 
me land for such purposes. I become irritable at this oppression. 
I think Lord Grey and you will catch the kindred flame. Your 
affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 

512.] To Lord Murray. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 29, 1843. 
My dear Murray, 
Jeffrey has written to me to say he means to dedicate his Essays 
to me. This I think a very great honour, and it pleases me very 
much. I am sure he ought to resign. He has very feeble health; 
a mild climate would suit the state of his throat. Mrs Jeffrey 
thinks he could not employ himself. Wives know a great deal 
about husbands ; but, if she is right, I should be surprised. I 
have thought he had a canine appetite for books, though this 
sometimes declines in the decline of life. I am beautifying my 



596 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

house in Green Street ; a comfortable house is a great source of 
happiness. It ranks immediately after health and a good con- 
science. I see your religious war is begun in Scotland. I suppose 
Jeffrey will be at the head of the Free Church troops. Do you 
think he has any military talents? 

You are, I hear, attending more to diet than heretofore. If you 
wish for anything like happiness in the fifth act of life, eat and 
drink about one-half what you could eat and drink. Did I ever 
tell you my calculation about eating and drinking ? Having 
ascertained the weight of what I could live upon, so as to preserve 
health and strength, and what I did live upon, I found that, 
between ten and seventy years of age, I had eaten and drunk forty 
four-horse waggon-loads of meat and drink more than would have 
preserved me in life and health ! The value of this mass of 
nourishment I considered to be worth seven thousand pounds 
sterling. It occurred to me that I must, by my voracity, have 
starved to death fully a hundred persons. This is a frightful 
calculation, but irresistibly true ; and I think, dear Murray, your 
waggons would require an additional horse each ! 

Lord and Lady Lansdowne, who are rambling about this fine 
country, are to spend a day here next week. You must really come 
to see the West of England. From Combe Florey we will go 
together to Linton and Lymouth, than which there is nothing 
finer in this island. Two of our acquaintance dead this week, — 
Stewart Mackenzie and Bell ! We must close our ranks. God 
bless you, my dear Murray ! Sydney Smith. 



513.] To the Rev. Sydney Smith. 

[Inserted with the. permission of the Bishop of London.] 

Fulham, Oct. 31, 1843. 
My dear Sir, 
I have been" very much occupied during the last week, or I 
should have written to you before, to express the great pleasure 
which I have received from the intelligence of your kind and 
generous intentions towards young Mr Tate. It is a substantial 
proof of your regard for his father, and I really believe well 
deserved by the young man himself, who has been an active and 
useful curate of the parish which is now placed in his charge as 
vicar. 

This arrangement will be most cheering and consolatory to poor 
Mrs Tate.* I am, my dear Sir, yours faithfully, 

C. J. London, 

* See Memoir, Chapter X. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. $97 

514.] TO R. MONCKTON MlLNES, ESQ. 

Green Street, Nov. 8, 1843. 
My dear Sir, 
1 am glad the business is in such good hands ; it is the important 
measure of the day. As to any share I may take in it, it must 
depend upon my foot, ankle, and knee. If the Americans will not 
book.up, they must take the consequences. 

I am just going to pray for you at St Paul's, but with no very 
lively hope of success. Sydney Smith. 

515.] To Lord Murray. 

56 Green Street, Nov. 9, 1843. 
My dear Murray, 

I am afraid there is little chance of your coming so far as Combe 
Florey, but, if that could be done, it would give us sincere pleasure 
to show Mrs Murray and yourself our very pretty country ; in the 
meantime I shall look forward to the more probable chance of see- 
ing you here. 

Jeffrey's legs have as little to support as any legs in the island ; 
I cannot see why they should be out of order. I am delighted to 
find his general health so good. He is about to dedicate his 
Reviews to me. I said (what I sincerely felt) that I considered it 
as the greatest compliment ever paid to me. I shall be obliged to 
you for the herrings, and tell me, at the same time, how to dress 
them ; but perhaps I mistake, and they are to be eaten naked. 

Your exhortation comes too late. My letter in the u Chronicle '' 
was published before yours to me arrived. It is generally found 
fault with as being too favourable, and to this I plead guilty ; but 
I find I get more mild as I get older, and more unwilling to be 
severe. But if they do not (in business phrase) "book up" by 
Christmas, I shall set at them in good earnest. I have no sort of 
belief that they will ever pay, and I mean this week to sell out, I 
hope and believe at 61, five per cent, stock. Ever yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

516.] To Lady Ashburton. 

Dogmersfield Park, Dec. 3, 1843. 
Many thanks, dear Lady Ashburton ; but on the 7th I must be 
at Combe Florey, and remain there till my emersion in February. 
I return to London on Monday, and depart again for home im- 
mediately. All joking apart, — the real impediment to making visits 
is, that derangeable health which belongs to old age. I am never 
well when I arrive at a new house. The bread, the water, the 
hours, the bed, the change of bolster, — everything puts me out. I 



593 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

recover in two or thre*/ days, and then it is time to depart. This 
made a wise man say, that a man should give over arguing at 
thirty, riding at sixty, and visiting at seventy. 

I am truly sorry you are not well. I consider Lord- Ashburton 
and you as good friends, and I rejoice in your rejoicing, and am 

sorry for the ills which happen to you. I agree with you that 

is in the high road to Puseyism, and that is the postboy who 

is driving her there. She does not mind in the least what I say to 
her, and calls me a priest of Baal. 

Pray give my kind regards to the Plenipotentiary ; first taking 
the necessary precaution to state where I live, my profession, age, 
or anything that will awaken in him a recollection that he has seen 
me before. Ever, dear Lady Ashburton, most truly yours, 

Sydney Smith. 



517.] To Lord Murray. 

Green Street, Dec. 4, 1843. 

I have just read an admirable review of Senior's upon Ireland, foi 
the next Edinburgh Review. Nothing can be wiser or better; at 
the same time, how can any two enlightened persons differ upon 
such a subject ? 

Pray do not put off coming to town next year, or, at least, com- 
ing to Combe Florey ; for I am afraid I cannot put off dying much 
longer ; — not that I am ill, but old. I am very glad you like my 
American Letters. The question is, will they make them angry or 
honest, — or both ? I did not however mean to say what would 
make them pay, but to show them that their conduct had been 
shameful in not paying before, and should leave upon them this 
feeling, whether they ultimately paid or not. 

Tell William Murray, with my kindest regards, to get for you, 
when he comes to town, a book called " Arabiniana, or Remains of 
Mr Serjeant Arabin," — very witty and humorous. It is given away 
— not sold, but I have in vain endeavoured to get a copy. 

Sydney Smith. 



518.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Taunton, Dec. 10, 1843. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I hope you were amused with my attack upon the Americans, 
They really deserved it. It is a monstrous and increasing villany. 
Fancy a meeting in Philadelphia, convened by public advertisement, 
where they came to resolutions that the debt was too great for the 
people to pay, that the people could not pay it, and ought not to 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 599 

pay it ! I have not a conception that the creditors will ever have 
a single shilling. 

Tell Lord Grey I recommend to his attention, in the forthcoming 
Edinburgh Review, an article upon Ireland by Senior, the Master 
in Chancery, which I think admirable ; it contains, in my humble 
estimation, an enumeration of the medicines, and a statement of 
the treatment, necessary for your distracted country ; in defence of 
which I always state that it has at least produced Lady Grey. 

I keep my health tolerably well : occasionally fits of gout, but my 
eyes are in good preservation ; and while I can read and can write, 
I have no care about age. I should add another condition, — that 
I must have no pain. I am reading the Letters to George Selwyn, 
by which I am amused. Many of them are written with wit and 
spirit ; they bring before me people of whom I know a little ; and 
the notes are so copious, that the book makes a history of those 
times ; certainly, a history of the manners and mode of life of the 
upper orders of society. 

Remember me very kindly and affectionately to my friend and 
patron Lord Grey, and believe me as affectionately yours, 

Sydney Smith. 

519.] To Lord Murray. 

Combe Florey, Dec. 17, 1843. 
My dear Murray, 

Nothing can be better than the grouse ; they arrived in perfect 

preservation, and gave great satisfaction. Lady is staying 

here. She seems to be a very sensible and very worthy person. I 
must do her the justice to say that when my jokes are explained 
to her, and she has leisure to reflect upon them, she laughs very 
heartily. 

I am glad you like my American Letters. I see the rebound has 
taken place, and all the papers combine in abusing me. My firm 
opinion is, that they will never pay. The Legislature dares not 
impose the tax, — the people would never pay it. I shall not be 
unobservant of what is said in the American papers, and, if needs 
be, address a few more last words to Jonathan. 

Be sure that you keep to your plan of coming to England at 
Easter, to be fresh dyed. Depend upon it, it will do you good. 

Sydney Smith. 

520.] To Mrs Grote. 

December 18, 1843. 
My dear Mrs Grote, 
I hope the Irish fossils have reached you by this time, and that 
they are approved of. , . , . 



6oo LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

My bomb has fallen very successfully in America, and the list of 
killed and wounded is extensive. I have several quires of paper 
sent me every day, calling me monster, thief, atheist, deist, &c. 
Duff Green sent me three pounds of cheese, and a Captain Monigan 
a large barrel of American apples. The last news from America 
will, I think, lower the Pennsylvanian funds. 

I wonder how you are occupied. I am reading Montaigne. He 
thinks aloud, that is his great merit, but does not think remarkably 
well; mankind have improved in thinking and writing since that 
period. Have you read Senior's article for the forthcoming 
Edinburgh Review ? It is excellent, and does him great credit. 

I went, while in town, one night to the Sartoris', where Mrs 
Sartoris was singing divinely. Your sincere friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

521.] To Mrs Grote. 

Combe Florey, Dec. 23, 1843. 
Dear Mrs Grote, 

You are so energetic, that you never attend to anything in 
particular, but are always lost in generalities. I sent you a letter 
of Jeffrey's, which you have not returned. Are you satisfied that 
your friend Faucher was treated as well as Lord Jeffrey's health 
would permit ? 

You complain of the smallness of the potatoes : let me suggest 
the romantic plan of having the potatoes picked ; the large ones 
reserved for your table, the small ones for the pigs. It is by this 
ingenious and complicated process that the potatoes you get from 
the greengrocer in London are managed. There is no accounting 
for tastes. The potatoes I sent appear to me to be excellent. 

You have planted seven hundred firs ; the number is scarcely 
credible. Have you read the Swedish method of planting, under 
which the tree grows fourteen feet in one year ? It consists in 
burying half a pound of tallow candles with every fir planted. I 
cannot believe it ; but it is difficult to disbelieve what is published 
in a grave work. Ever your sincere friend, Sydney Smith. 



522.] To Sir George Philips. 

Co?nbe Florey, Dec. 28, 1843. 
My dear Philips, 
I am going to Bowood for five or six clays next week. I shall 
find Bobus there, who will come on from thence here. He is very 
>bh'nd, but bears up against the evils of age heroically. The great 
question of the next session will be the support of the Catholic 
elergy. Will Peel dare to bring it on ? Will he be able to carry 



LETTERS OE THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 601 

it in and out of the House, if he does ? Longman has printed my 
American Letters in the shape of a small pamphlet, and it has a 
very great circulation. I receive presents of cheese and apples 
from Americans who are advocates for paying debts, and very 
abusive letters in print and in manuscript from those who are not. 
I continue to think the Pennsylvanians will not pay ; and so thinks, 
as I hear, Jones Loyd. Your old and affectionate friend, 

Sydney Smith. 

523.] To Mrs Holland. 

December j 1843. 
My dear Saba, 

I will bear in mind the name and misfortunes of Mr B., and if 
any opportunity occurs, will endeavour to make myself useful to 
him ; but, as you may suppose, I am up to the ears in clergymen. 
Your mother sent you the flaming panegyric of me in the " Morn- 
ing Chronicle" (and sent it at my desire, because I am sure it 
would give you pleasure, as I see you have an honest pride in the 
praises of your father) ; whether right or wrong others must deter- 
mine, if any one thinks about it ; but I should really deserve some 
praise if I could write as well as my eulogist. 

Your mother and I mean to have a twelfth-cake, and draw kings 
and queens alone. Pray desire G. Hibbert to let us know whether 
and when he will come, and don't forget this message. Many 
thanks for your kindness in getting Charlotte Loch * a place ; the 
misfortune of the poor girl is that she has not been taught millinery 
and mantuamaking Give my love to all your party ; and believe 
me, your affectionate father, Sydney Smith. 



524.] To Mrs Holland. 

Combe F/orey, December. 
My dearest Daughter, 

Many pardons for not having written to you according to pro- 
mise ; but the calf and the kitchen-maid both kept their beds, 
George Strong had quinsy, and the shafts were broken. I had a 
very agreeable journey down, going in the public carriages, — an 
infinitely more agreeable method than in a private vehicle. I felt 
as little fatigue as in my arm-chair in this library, and could have 
gone on to the world's end without being tired. 

The whole country is divided between the Clerk of the Peace and 
Captain Mars, who has challenged him. Mars, the God of War, 
challenging the Clerk of the Peace ! I am studying the question 
deeply, as is Cecil. 

Not a breath of wind; a solemn stillness; all nature fast asleep; 

* One of his p.irishlor.ere, about whom he was interested. 



6o2 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

Storm and Tempest bound over to keep the peace ! There never 
was such a period. 

Love to Holland and the children. Ever your affectionate father, 
Sydney Smith. 

525.] To his Grandchild. 

On sending hint a Letter over weight. 
Oh, you little wretch ! your letter cost me fourpence. I will pull 
all the plums out of your puddings ; I will undress your dolls and 
steal their under petticoats ; you shall have no currant-jelly to your 
rice ; I will kiss you till you cannot see out of your eyes ; when 
nobody else whips you, I will do so ; I will fill you so full of sugar- 
plums that they shall run out of your nose and ears ; lastly, your 
frocks shall be so short that they shall not come below your knees. 
Your loving grandfather, Sydney Smith. 



526 'J To Miss Berry. ~ 

1843. 

I hope, my dear friend, you are well. I met the lofty P on 

the railroad, and he gave me some account of you, but not enough 
for my ravenous desire of your welfare. Oh, happy woman ! the 
suburban beauties of Richmond were not enough ; but Providence 

sent you , a woman of piety and ancient faith ; and the preux 

chevalier, sans penr et sans reproche / 

Mrs Sydney and I are tolerably well. The diminished tempera- 
ture has restored my locomotive powers, such as they are ; but in 
the dog-days I could not move. 

We have had Tommy Moore and Lady Morley, and a few more 
unknown to fame. Dr Holland has just made a rush from Combe 
Florey to Jerusalem. By the by, I saw a piece of news the other 
day, in which a gentleman made his good fortune known to the 
world in the public papers. " Last week the Rev. Elias Johnson 
was made Examining Chaplain to the Bishop of Jerusalem ! " I 
should like to know what his questions are to the candidates. 

I presume you have never been a day without crowds. Has the 
Davy glittered at Richmond ? By deaths and marriages the world 
is thinned since we met. My kindest regards to Lady Charlotte, to 
both of you, and those of Mrs Sydney. Yours, Sydney Smith. 



5 37> J To the Countess of Morley.* Nq j afe 

Dear Lady Morley, 
Pray understand me rightly : I do not give the Bluecoat theory 

* This letter seems to have been after a conversation given in the Narrative, Chapter 
XI., where the subject is alluded to. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 603 

as an established fact, but as a highly probable conjecture 5 look at 
the circumstances. At a very early age young Quakers disappear ; 
at a very early age the Coat-boys are seen ; at the age of seventeen 
or eighteen young Quakers are again seen ; at the same age the 
Coat-boys disappear : who has ever heard of a Coat-man ? The 
thing is utterly unknown in natural history. Upon what other 
evidence does the migration of the grub into the aurelia rest ? After 
a certain number of days the grub is no more seen, and the aurelia 
flutters over his relics. That such a prominent fact should have 
escaped our naturalists is truly astonishing ; I had long suspected 
it, but was afraid to come out with a speculation so bold, and now 
mention it as protected and sanctioned by you. 

Dissection would throw great light upon the question ; and if our 

friend would receive two boys into his house about the time 

of their changing their coats, great service would be rendered to the 
cause. 

Our friend Lord Grey, not remarkable for his attention to natural 
history, was a good deal struck with the novelty and ingenuity of 
the hypothesis. I have ascertained that the young Bluecoat infants 
are fed with drab-coloured pap, which looks very suspicious. 
More hereafter on this interesting subject. Where real science is 
to be promoted, I will make no apology to your Ladyship for this 
intrusion. Yours truly, Sydney Smith. 



528.] From the Countess ofMorley. 

No date. 

Had I received your letter two days since, I should have said 
your arguments and theory were perfectly convincing, and that the 
most obstinate sceptic must have yielded to them ; but I have 
come across a person in that interval who gives me information 
which puts us all at sea again. That the Bluecoat boy should be 
the larva of the Quaker in Great Britain is possible, and even pro- 
bable, but we must take a wider view of the question ; and here, I 
confess, I am bewildered by doubts and difficulties. The Bluecoat 
is an indigenous animal— not so the Quaker ; and now be so good 
as to give your whole mind to the facts I have to communicate. I 
have seen and talked much with Sir R. Ker Porter on this inter- 
esting subject. He has travelled over the whole habitable globe, 
and has penetrated with a scientific and scrutinising eye into regions 
hitherto unexplored by civilised man ; and yet he has never seen a 
Quaker baby. He has lived for years in Philadelphia (the national 
nest of Quakers) ; he has roamed up and down Broadways and 
lengthways in every nook and corner of Pennsylvania ; and yet he 
never saw a Quaker baby ; and what is new and most striking, 



604 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH, 

never did he see a Quaker lady in a situation which gave hope that 
a Quaker baby might be seen hereafter. This is a stunning fact, 
and involving the question in such impenetrable mystery as will, I 
fear, defy even your sagacity, acuteness, and industry to elucidate. 
But let us not be checked and cast down ; truth is the end and ob- 
ject of our research. Let us not bate one jot of heart and hope, but 
still benr wp and steer our course right onward. Yours most truly, 

F. MORLEY. 



529.] To the Countess of Morley.* 

Noble countenance, expressing quite sufficient when at rest, 
too much when in activity. Middling voice, provincial accent, 
occasional bad taste, language often very happy, with flights of 
mere eloquence ; not the vehicle of reasoning or profound remark. 
Very difficult, when the sermon was over, to know what it was 
about ; and the whole effect rather fatiguing and tiresome. Dear 
Lady Morley, pray tell me whether you agree with me. Most 
truly yours, Sydney Smith. 

530.] To Mrs Grote. 

Combe Florey, Jan. 3, 1844. 
My dear Mrs Grote, 

You have seen more than enough of my giving the living of 
Edmonton to a curate. The first thing the unscriptural curate 
does, is to turn out his fellow-curate, the son of him who was vicar 
before his father. Is there not some story in Scripture of the debtor 
who had just been excused his debt, seizing his fellow-servant by 
the throat, and casting him into prison ? The Bishop, the Dean 
and Chapter, and I have in vain expostulated ; he perseveres in 
his harshness and cruelty. 

Senior has just left us; he seems to have gained great credit 
from his Irish article. I am always very much pleased with your 
commendation. I am really sincere in my love of what is honest 
and liberal, and I wrote with no lack of moral wrath. 

I am going on Thursday to Bowood, where my brother is ; he 
returns with me. Everett is coming here, and on the 15 th the 
Hibberts. Mrs Sydney is uncommonly well ; I thought I was 
going to be very ill during the close, muggy weather, but this frost 
has restored me to life ; and so I return to my text, by asking why 
you suppose your letters are not agreeable ? 

Sydney Smith. 

* Thir. was written after hearing: Irving preach. 






LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 605 

531.] To Mrs . 

Combe Florey, Jan. 23, 1844. 

Many thanks, dear Mrs , for your agreeable letter. You 

seem to be leading a happy life ; making a pleasing exception to 

the generality of mankind, who are miserable. writes to 

me at long intervals. I think I am falling into desuetude and 
disgrace. 

Your list of French visitors is, I dare say, very splendid, but I 
am so ignorant of French society, that they are most of them 
unknown to me ; I mean, unknown by reputation, as well as 
personally. I should like more of a mixture. You seem to have 
too much talent in your drawing-room. I met Berryer at the 
Chancellor's in London, and was much struck with his physiognomy 
and manner. 

Poor Miss Fox (as I believe you know) has had a slight paralytic 
stroke. She was a most beautiful specimen of human excellence. 
I have been in the country ever since the middle of December, and 
know nothing about men and things. I am tolerably well, but in- 
tolerably old. 

Jeffrey is laid up with a bad leg, which is getting rather serious. 
Have you seen his publication in four volumes, dedicated to me ? 
I told him it was the greatest compliment I had ever received in 
my life. 

I receive every day letters of abuse and congratulation from 
America, for my three epistles. I continue to think they will never 
pay, and I continue to value you very much. I am very glad Mr 
— — is better, and I beg you to accept my affectionate benediction, 

Sydney Smith. 



532.] To Mrs Holland. 

January ', 1844. 
Dear Saba, 
People of wealth and rank never use ugly names for ugly things. 
Apoplexy is an affection of the head ; paralysis is nervousness ; 
gangrene is pain and inconvenience in the extremities. All that I 

heard from D , who falls into this kind of subterfutive language, 

was that Miss was indisposed, and it was only after your letter 

that I got anything like the truth from him ; she is certainly in 
danger, and he says that he should not be surprised to hear of her 

death. Poor dear ! So it is, that the best as well as the worst 

disappear. I am heartily sorry for the . Bobus and Mr Eve- 

rett are staying here. God bless you ! Ever affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 



606 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

533.] To Mrs Holland. 

Combe Florey, 1544. 
My dear Saba, 

Are you sure that you are sufficiently acquainted with what the 
strength of cider ought to be, to determine that your cider has been 
adulterated? The farmer has the character of being a remarkably 
honest man, and his reputation is at stake. Send me down here a 
couple of bottles, which I will compare with his cider. George 
Hibbert is here. Your mother has no illness, but much malaise. 
I complain of nothing but weakness, and want of nervous energy ; 
I look as strong as a cart-horse, but I cannot get round the garden 
without resting once or twice, so deficient am I in nervous energy. 
I doubt whether to attribute this to old age, and to consider it as 
inevitable, or to blame this soft, and warm, and disinvigorating 
climate. I believe if I were at Ramsgate or Brighton I should be 
strong. 

I think Bobus much too adventurous for the powers of his sight ; 
he lives in constant danger, but not fear, of a tremendous fall ; and 
to walk, as he does, in the streets, is positive insanity. His blind- 
ness is singular ; he can see a mote, but not a beam, — the smaller 
anything is, the better he sees it ; he could see David, but would 
run against Goliath. 

We propose to be in London about the 20th, of which you may 
inform a fond and expecting capital. I have said nothing to your 
mother of the marble chimney-pieces * in the drawing-rooms ; I 
think she will faint with joy when she sees them. God bless you, 
dear Saba ! My kind regards to Holland. Your affectionate 
father, Sydney Smith. 

534.] To Mrs Grote. 

Combe Florey, Jan. 31, 1844. 
My dear Mrs Grote, 
Your fall entirely proceeded from your despising the pommel of 
the saddle, — a species of pride to which many ladies may attribute 
fractures and death. When I rode (which, I believe, was in the 
middle of the last century) I had a holding-strap fixed somewhere 
near the pommel, and escaped many falls by it. 

Nothing ever does happen at Combe Florey, and nothing has 
happened. 

Old age is not so much a scene of illness as of malaise. I think 
every day how near I am to death. I am very weak, and very 
breathless. Everett, the American Minister, has been here at the 
same time with my eldest brother. We all liked him, and were 

* See Memoir, Chapter VIII, 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 607 

confirmed in our good opinion of him. A sensible, unassuming 
man, always wise and reasonable. 

"If I take this dose of calomel, shall I be well immediately?" 
" Certainly not," replies the physician. " You have been in bed 
these six weeks ; how can you expect such a sudden cure ? But I 
can tell you you will never be well without it, and that it will tend 
materially to the establishment of your health." So, the pay to the 
Catholic Clergy. They will not be immediately satisfied by the 
measure, but they will never be satisfied without it, and it will have 
a considerable tendency to produce that effect. It will not supersede 
other medicines, but it is an indispensable preliminary to them. 

If you dine with Lady , it is a sure proof that you are a 

virtuous woman ; she collects the virtuous. I have totally for- 
gotten all about the American debt, but I continue to receive 
letters and papers from the most remote corners of the United 
States, with every vituperative epithet which human rage has 
invented. Your affectionate friend, Sydney Smith. 



535.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

Combe Florey, February, 1844. 
My dear Lady Carlisle, 

We have read every account of Lord Carlisle, and inquired of 
every one who could give us any information, and have been 
unwilling to add to your cares and distractions by inquiries which 
might put you under the necessity of writing. Pray say all that is 
kind, and friendly, and affectionate, from this family to him. To 
be cared and thought about is some pleasure to the sick, even 
when that solicitude comes from a country parson and his wife. 
The danger seems to be over ; the business now is to mitigate 
pain, and to amuse. Mrs Sydney is tolerably well ; I cannot 
breathe, or walk, and am very weak ; in other respects I am well 
also. We go to London on Tuesday, and are busy packing up ten 
times as many things as we shall ever want. 

I beg you do not answer this note ; it requires none. I only 
write it to say, don't imagine we are inattentive to what is passing 
at Castle Howard, because we respect your time and are sensible of 
your many serious cares. Castle Howard befriended me when I 
wanted friends ; I shall never forget it, till I forget all. 

I remain, with respectful affection, your friend, 

Sydney Smith. 



60S LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

536.] To Charles Dickens, Esq. 

56 Green Street, Feb. a I, 1844, 
Dear Dickens, 
Many thanks for the M Christmas Carol," which I shall immedi- 
ately proceed upon, in preference to six American pamphlets I 
found upon my arrival, all promising immediate payment ! Yours 
ever, Sydney Smith. 

537.] To the Countess Grey. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I give two dinners next week to the following persons, whom I 
enumerate, as I know Lady Georgiana loves a little gossip. First 
dinner — Lady Holland, Eastlake, Lord and Lady Monteagle, Lut- 
trell, Lord Auckland, Lord Campbell, Lady Stratheden, Lady Dun- 
stanville, Baring Wall, and Mr Hope. Second dinner — Lady 
Charlemont, Lord Glenelg, Lord and Lady Denman, Lord and 
Lady Cottenham, Lord and Lady Langdale, Sir Charles Lemon, 
Mr Hibbert, Landseer, and Lord Clarendon. 

The Ministry are very much vexed at the majority of Lord Ash- 
ley, and are making great efforts to beat him ; and it does seem to 
be absurd to hinder a woman of thirty from working as long as she 
pleases ; but mankind are getting mad with humanity and Samari- 
tanism. 

I preached the other Sunday a sermon on peace, and against the 
excessive proneness to war ; and I read them two or three extracts 
from the accounts of victories. It was very much liked. I shall 
try the same subject again, — a subject utterly untouched by the 
clergy. 

I am reading the Letters to George Selwyn, which entertain me 
a good deal, though I think it a shameful publication. The picture 
of the year is to be Jairus's Daughter, by Eddis. 

We are all tolerably well here, and send a thousand regards to 
all. God bless you ! Sydney Smith. 

538.] To the Countess Grey. 

Green Street, Feb. 28, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I am quite delighted to learn from so many sources that Lord 
Grey is so much better, and I trust we shall see him in town after 
Easter. 

What news have I to tell you? Notning but what the papers 
will tell you better. Howick's speech is universally praised for its 
honesty and ability. I think O'Connell will have two years' im- 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. ^09 

prisonment, and the Government and the Irish Courts have come 
off much better than it was supposed they would do. 

We have not very good accounts from Castle Howard. There 
is a rumour that Lord Ashburton is employed in holy flirting with 
the Pope. The common idea, that a finrmunire is incurred by 
these flirtations, or that there is any law enacting penalties for com- 
munications with his Holiness, is erroneous. 

Four volumes of Burke's " Letters to the Marquis of Rocking- 
ham," are about to be published. I am not sorry to come to London. 
I have been living upon commonplaces and truisms for three 
months. I always fatten and stupefy on such diet ; I want to lose 
flesh and gain understanding. The new Lady -— dined with 

Lady on Sunday. I thought she would have fainted. The 

page always has sal-volatile at hand for first introductions. 

Affectionately yours, Sydney Smith. 

539.] To the Countess Grey. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

God bless you, and support you in great trials, such as the illness 
of so good and great a man, and one who has played so distin- 
guished a part in the events of these times ! Convey to him my 
ardent wishes for his safety and exemption from pain. I am a great 
believer in his constitution, and feel sure that we shall yet have 
many conversations about the wonderful things of this world. 

I send you a very honest and sensible sermon, — so little like 
most sermons, that I think our dear Earl might read it, or have it 
read to him ; but let that honest Howick read it, who loves every- 
thing that is bold, and true, and honest ; and send it back to me 

when it is done with. Only think of the iniquity of young . 

No sooner does he find himself extricated from poverty and misery, 
than the first thing he does is to turn out a poor curate, the son of 
the former vicar, before his father ! His conduct has been quite 
abominable. 

I go on Tuesday, for two or three days, to Bowood, where a large 
party is assembled : amongst the rest, Lady Holland. We are 
dying of heat. I sleep with my windows open every night. The 
birds are all taken in, and building ; the foolish flowers are blowing. 
Human creatures alone are in the secret, and know what is to 
happen in a week or two. 

I met Mr in town. I have never joined in the general ad- 
miration for this person. I think his manners rude and insolent. 
His conversation is an eternal persiflage, and is therefore weari- 
some. It seems as if he did not think it worth while to talk sense 
or seriousness before his company, and that he had a right to 

20; 



610 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

abandon himself to any nonsense which happened to come upper- 
most ; which nonsense many of his company remembered to have 
come uppermost often before. I receive every day from America 
letters and pamphlets without end. I verily believe the United 
States are cracking. A nation cannot exist in such a state of 
morals. 

Give my kindest and most affectionate regards to Lord Grey ; 
and believe me ever, dear Lady Grey, your sincere and affection- 
ate friend, Sydney Smith. 

540-] To the Countess Grey. 

Green Street, March 9, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

With your occupations and anxieties, I hold you entirely 
acquitted for not writing to me, and pray let this be understood 
between us. I take so much interest in Lord Grey's recovery, that 
I am rejoiced to see your handwriting, but always afraid that your 
own health will suffer by gratifying the affectionate curiosity of 
your friends. 

The Whigs and Democrats are full of a notion that O'Connell is 
not to be punished ; that the Government, yielding to the opinion 
that his trial has been unfair, are not to bring him up for judg- 
ment. I am not of this opinion. I think, unless their own law- 
officers were to tell them that this trial had been unfair, the Govern- 
ment are bound to deal with O'Connell as they would with any one 
else ; and I believe they will do so. I have heard some of our 
English judges say his sentence ought to be for two years. As for 
the danger of shutting him up, if you cannot do that, then there is 
a civil war ; and the sooner it is fought out the better. 

God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! Kindest regards to my Lord. 

Sydney Smith. 



541.] To the Countess Grey. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I am beginning Burke's Letters, or rather, have gone through 
one volume ; full of details which do not interest me, and there are 
no signs yet of that beautiful and fruitful imagination which is the 
great charm of Burke. With the politics of so remote a period I 
do not concern myself. 

The weather is improved here, and the harvest is got in ; and a 
very good harvest it is. 

I hope Lord Grey observes the ministerial relaxations towards 
the Catholics. It is a very difficult question to know what to do 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 61 i 

with O'Connell. The only question is the pacification of Ireland, 
and the effect that his detention or liberation would produce upon 
that country. All private pique and anger must be swallowed up 
in this paramount object. Lord Heytesbury is a man of good 
sense. I have no fear of a French war as long as Louis Philippe 
is alive : and live he will, for they cannot hit him, and seem to 
have left off shooting at him in despair. After that, nothing but 
nonsense and folly ; but before then, I shall probably be dead 
myself. 

You talk of your climate ; I dare say it has its evils, but nothing 
so bad as the enervating character of this. It would unstring the 
nerves of a giant, and demoralise the soul of Cato. We have just 
sent off a cargo of London people, who have been staying here 
three weeks. They say that all their principles and virtues are 
gone ! My kindest regards to your noble patient. 

Sydney Smith. 



542.] To Miss G. Harcourt. 

Combe Florey, 1844. 
My dear Georgiana, 

I set off in despair of reaching home, but, on the contrary, Mrs 
Sydney got better every scream of the railroad, and is now con- 
siderably improved. Many thanks for your kind and friendly 
inquiries. I was confined three days in London waiting for Mrs 
Sydney's recovery : they seemed months. Nothing can exceed the 
beauty of the country ; I am forced to own that. 

I have been reading Arnold's Life, by Stanley. Arnold seems 
to have been a very pious, honest, learned, and original man. 

I hope the Archbishop has resumed the use of his legs ; for if an 
archbishop be a pillar of the Church, and the pillar cannot stand, 
what becomes of the incumbent weight ? And neither of us, dear 
Georgiana, would consent to survive the ruin of the Church. You 
would plunge a poisoned pin into your heart, and I should swallow 
the leaf of a sermon dipped in hydrocyanic acid. - — would pro- 
bably rejoice in the loss of us both, for in her Church the greater 
the misery, the greater the happiness ; they rejoice in woe, and 
wallow in dolours. 

Be a good girl, and write me a line every now and then, to tell 
me about my old friends ; and believe me to be always your affec- 
tionate friend, S. S. 



612 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

543] To the Countess Grey. 

Green Street, Grosvenor Square, 
March 27, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I think Charming an admirable writer. So much sense and 
eloquence ! such a command of language ! Yet admirable as his 
sermon on war is, I have the vanity to think my own equally good, 
quite as sensible, quite as eloquent, as full of good principle and 
fine language ; and you will be the more inclined to agree with me 
in this comparison, when I tell you that I preached in St Paul's the 
identical sermon which Lord Grey so much admires. I thought I 
could not write anything half so good, so I preached Channing. 

You can hardly expect to go on straightforward in recovering ; 
sometimes you will stop, sometimes recover twice as much in one 
week as you have done in three weeks preceding. If this day is 
with you as it is with us, it ought to be the first of going out. It 
is real spring. 

What an odd state politics are in ! It is not at all impossible 
that Ministers will go out. God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! 

Sydney Smith. 



544.] To the Countess Grey. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Your account seems good of Lord Grey. I envy him the taste 
of fresh air after such a long confinement, to say nothing of the fine 
feeling which cessation from pain produces ; not that I would be 
ill, but that I consider these feelings as some little abatement of 
evil. 

The Government are to have this year, I understand, a very 
splendid budget ; but obtained, of course, by the pernicious 
auxiliary of the Income Tax. 

What a singular event, — these divisions upon the working hours 
of the common people ! The protection of children -is perhaps 
right ; but everything beyond is mischief and folly. It is generally 
believed, that if the Ten Hours Bill is carried, Government will 

resign. I am a decided duodecimalist. is losing his head. 

When he brings forward his Suckling Act, he will be considered as 
quite mad. No woman to be allowed to suckle her own child 
without medical certificates. Three classes — viz., free sticklers, 
half sucklers, and spoon-meat mothers. Mothers whose supply 
is uncertain, to suckle upon affidavit ! How is it possible that an 
Act of Parliament can supply the place of nature and natural affec- 
tion ? Have you any nonsense equal to thie in Northumberland? 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 613 

I think I could write a good sermon against war, but I doubt if 
I shall preach any more. It makes me ill ; I get violently excited, 
and tire myself to death. 

is gone to Paris. He made a sensation at the Drawing- 
room, by asking the Queen, at some length, if he could take parcels 
or letters for her ! 

I have some thoughts of going to Brighton to-morrow, but I 
believe indolence will prevail. I pray for fine weather for Lord 
Grey. It will be his cure when it does come. God bless you ! 

S. S. 



545.] To the Countess Grey. 

April 22, 1844. 

I hear from all quarters, dear Lady Grey, that Lord Grey is 
going on as well as possible ; that is, that he is keeping pace with 
my hopes and wishes. Has Lord Grey read the Edinburgh 
Review ? The article on Barrere is by Macaulay, that upon Lord 
St Vincent by Barrow. I think the latter very entertaining ; but 
it was hardly worth while to crucify Barrere : Macaulay might as 
well have selected Turpin. 

I have no knews to tell you. It is generally thought the Duke of 
Wellington has been unguarded about the Directors. Peel's bank 
plan is admired and approved ; so is the appointment of Hardinge. 
God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! Yours affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 



546.] To the Countess Grey. 

May 29, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey,- 

I am afraid you are not going on so well as heretofore, and I am 
almost afraid to ask you your present condition : therefore do as 
you are inclined, and if to send me such news as you have to send 
gives you pain, do not send it. 

Mrs Sydney had a sharp attack of pain yesterday, which pre- 
vented us from going to Lady Essex's play, which has been acted 
with universal approbation in Eelgrave Square. I was very glad 
not to be there, as I am sure I should have been tired to death. If 
real actors cannot amuse me, how should pretended actors do so ? 
Can mock-turtle please where real turtle is disliked ? 

I think we now have O'Connell safe between walls. I look upon 
his punishment as one of the most useful events which have taken 
place in my time. It vindicates the law, shows the subject that the 
Government is not to be braved, and puts an end for many years 
to the blustering and bullying of Ireland. Their perseverance is 



614 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

creditable to Ministers. There was, my dear Lady Grey, a serious 
intention to go out ; but it was too ridiculous. 

I am inclined to think you are going on tolerably well, for I ask 
everybody who is likely to know, and make out the best account I 
can ; but your own case puzzles me. 

1 am going to dine with to-day. The rumour increases of 

her having murdered Dr ■ . The question is, Where is he ? 

What was that large box taken away at two in the morning ? 

Read Arnold's Life, by Stanley, and Twiss's Life of Lord Eldon. 
The latter is not badly done, and I think it would much amuse 
Lord Grey, as it is the history almost of his times. Lord Eldon 
was the bigoted enemy of every sort of improvement ; and retarded, 
by his influence, for more than twenty-five years, those changes 
which the state of the country absolutely required. Ever affection- 
ately yours, Sydney Smith. 



547.] To M. Eugene Robin.* 

Parts, June 29, 1844. 
Sir, 

Your application to me does me honour, and requires, on your 
part, no sort of apology. 

It is scarcely possible to speak much of self, and I have little or 
nothing to tell which has not been told before in my preface. 

I am seventy-four years of age ; and being Canon of St Paul's in 
London, and a rector of a parish in the country, my time is divided 
equally between town and country. I am living amongst the best 
society in the metropolis, and at ease in my circumstances ; in 
tolerable health, a mild Whig, a tolerating Churchman, and much 
given to talking, laughing, and noise. I dine with the rich in 
London, and physic the poor in the country j passing from the 
sauces of Dives to the sores of Lazarus. I am, upon the whole, a 
happy man ; have found the world an entertaining world, and am 
thankful to Providence for the part allotted to me in it. If you 
wish to become more informed respecting the actor himself, I must 
refer you to my friend Van de Weyer, who knows me well, and is 
able (if he will condescend to do so) to point out the good and the 
evil within me. If you come to London, I hope you will call on me, 
and enable me to make your acquaintance ; and in the meantime 
I beg you to accept every assurance of my consideration and 
respect. Sydney Smith. 

* M. Eugene Robin had made an application to Mr Sydney Smith, through Mr Van 
de Weyer, for some particulars of his life, of which he wished to give a sketch in the 
" Revue des Deux Mondes." 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 61$ 

548.] To his Excellency M. Van de Weyer. 

Combe Florey, July 31, 1844. 
Dear Van de Weyer, 
Have not some letters been published in modern times, contain- 
ing the remonstrances of Alva to Philip, and of Philip to Alva, 
against the cruelties practised by the Spaniards in the Low Coun- 
tries, and recommending milder measures ? and if so, pray tell me 
in what book such letters are to be found. Have you seen a 
History of Holland, in three volumes, by a Mrs Davis, published 
by Walton, Strand ; or heard any character of it ? 

How do you do, and all the family ? Will you come to the West 
— I mean to Combe Florey — in the month of August ? and what 
day ? Will you believe me (as you safely may) yours sincerely, 

Sydney Smith. 

549.] To Mrs Grote. 

Combe Florey, July, 1844. 
Dear Mrs Grote, 

Our squire died the very day we came home. Do you want any 
land? 

I have been reading the Life of Arnold of Rugby, who seems to 
be a learned, pure, and honest Liberal ; and with much zeal and 
unaffected piety. From this I proceeded to the life of the most 
heartless, bigoted, and mischievous of human beings, who passed 
a long life in perpetuating all sorts of abuses, and in making 
money by them. 

I am afraid this country does look enchantingly beautiful ; you 
know the power truth has over me. There is nothing new, — I will 
not say under the sun, for we have no sun in England, — but under 
the fogs and clouds. The best thing I have seen for some time is 
the declaration of the Government of their good intentions towards 
the Roman Catholics. 

I am not expecting any particular person, but generally, all man- 
kind and womankind. . . . Yours affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 

550.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

Combe Florey, August, 1844. 
My dear Lady Carlisle, 
I have been leading a very musical life lately. There is an 
excellent musical family living in London ; and finding them all 
ill, and singing flat, I brought them down here for three weeks, 
where they have grown extremely corpulent, and have returned to 
London with no other wish than to be transported after this life to 



616 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

this paradise of Combe Florey. Their singing is certainly very 
remarkable, and the little boy, at the age of seven, composes 
hymns ; I mean, sets them to music. I have always said that if 
I were to begin life again, I would dedicate it to music ; it is the 
only cheap and unpunished rapture upon earth. 

has not yet signified her intentions under the sign 

manual ; but a thousand rumours reach me, and my firm belief is, 
she will come. I have spoken to the sheriff, and mentioned it to the 
magistrates. They have agreed to address her ; and she is to be 
escorted from the station by the yeomanry. The clergy are rather 
backward ; but I think that, after a little bashfulness, they will 
wait upon her. Brunei, assisted by the ablest philosophers, is to 
accompany her upon the railroad ; and they have been so good as 
to say that the steam shall be generated from soft water, with a 
slight infusion of chamomile flowers. 

I am glad to see that Sir Robert Peel is softening a little towards 
the Catholics. That is the great point, in comparison of which 
Pomare* and Morocco are nothing. 

I think we shall go for some days to the sea-side. I wish we 
could find such an invigorating air as you have at Scarborough ; 
but our atmosphere is soft, demoralising, and debilitating. All love 
of duty, all sense of propriety, are extinguished in these enervating 
climates. The only one of my Yorkshire virtues which I retain, is 
a sincere regard for Castle Howard and its inhabitants ; to whom 
health and prosperity, and every earthly blessing ! From your 
obliged and sincere friend, Sydney Smith. 



551.] To Dr Holland. 

Combe Florey, August, 1844. 
My dear Holland, 

I ought to have answered your letter before, but I have been so 
strenuously employed in doing nothing, that I have not had time 
to do so. Whatever Mrs Sydney may say of herself, I think she is 
very languid from her late attack in London, and that she needs the 
sea-side ; and there I mean to go for some days. Jeffrey is under 
the care of a committee, consisting of Mr and Mrs Empson, his wife, 
the footman, and a Highland nurse, and they report to his admirers, 
consisting of several scores of young ladies, and others well ad- 
vanced in years ; it is a science by itself, the management of that 
little man, and I am afraid, unless you could affect all the committee 
simultaneously with the principal, your science would be in vain. 

I hope you will have good weather for your journey. Beg of all 
your party, when they come in at night, fatigued, hungry, and ex- 
hausted, to sit down and write their journals, but not to show them 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 6:7 

to me. I keep clear of gout, but always imagine I am going off in 
an apoplexy or palsy, and that the death-warrant is come down. I 
saw the other day, in midday, a ball of fire, with a tail as long as 
the garden, rush across the heavens, and descend towards the earth; 
that it had some allusion to me and my affairs I did not doubt, but 
I could not tell what, till I found the cow had slipped her calf : 
this made all clear. Ever yours affectionately, Sydney Smith. 



552.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Aug. 20, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I don't hear a word about the war, but your correspondents are 
much more likely to be well informed upon this point than mine. 
There are not two more intelligent men in the kingdom than Wood 
and Howick ; and they write from the great news-market. I mean 
to go on Tuesday, 27th, to the sea-side, at Sidmouth, with Mrs 
Sydney, there to stay some days. It is exactly a place to suit you 
to winter in ; so warm, beautiful, and sheltered ; — and very good 
houses for nothing. 

I am thinking of writing a pamphlet to urge the necessity of 
paying the Catholic clergy ; but the ideas are all so trite, and the 
arguments so plain and easy, that I gape at the thoughts of such a 
production. Lord Grey can have no doubt of the wisdom of pay- 
ing the Catholic clergy. I should like very much to go to Ireland 
for a fortnight ; I am sure I could learn a great deal in that time ; 
but the indolence, the timidity, and the uncertain health of old age 
keep me at home. 

Don't talk of giving up the world, — we shall all meet again in 
Berkeley Square. Lady Georgiana will play the harp, the physi- 
cian will sing, will look melancholy, and Lady Caroline Avill 

be making shrewd remarks to herself ; I shall be all that is ortho- 
dox and proper ; Lord Grey will be inclined to laugh. God bless 
you, dear Lady Grey ! S. S. 

553.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

Combe Florey y Aug. 25, 1844, 

My dear Lady Carlisle, 

I think the enclosed will amuse Lord Carlisle. Mr Wainwright* 

is known to Morpeth, as well as to myself, and is a most amiable 

clergyman, who paid a visit to this country two or three years since : 

The fact is unknown to any of his congregation, but when in 

this country he went once to the Opera, and supped with Loid 

Lyndhurst afterwards. In private, he often wore a short cassock, 

* A distinguished minister of the Episcopalian Church, United States, since dead. 



618 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

like a bishop's, and looked at himself for a long time in the glass. 
He carried over one of these cassocks to America, that Mrs Wain- 
wright might see him in it. 

We are going for a week to Sidmouth, that paradise of the 
waves. Sydney Smith. 

554.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

No date. 
My dear Lady Carlisle, 

Do not let Morpeth persuade you that Alexis is anything but an 
impostor. There seems to be something missing in London ; and 
I find, upon reflection, it is Lord Carlisle and yourself. 

The Archbishop of York is laid up with a sprained ankle ; 
sprained at a christening ! How very singular ! It is such a 
quiescent ceremony, that I thought I might have guaranteed at its 
celebration all the ligaments of the human body. He is never a 
moment without a bishop or a dowager duchess coming to call. 

What shall I say of my unworthy self, but that I am well, rich, 
and tolerably healthy ? Mrs Sydney has no great illness, though 
much malaise. I hear that Lord Carlisle is wheeled down to the 
gallery, and gets a little fresh air at the door. I know all the 
locale so well that I see him in his transit, and he takes with him 
my best and kindest wishes wherever he goes. 

Sir Robert Peel and I have made friends ; and so you will say, 
dear Lady Carlisle, that I want to be a bishop. But I thank God 
often that I am not a bishop ; and I want nothing in this world 
but the friendship and goodwill of such good persons as yourself. 

Alas ! how short is a sheet of paper ! What remains must con- 
vey my affection and respect to my excellent friends at Castle 
Howard. And may God bless them ! Sydney Smith. 



555.] To the Countess Grey. 

Sidmouth, Aug. 29, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I think I shall turn out to be right, and that there will be no war 
immediately. What the scramble for the fragments of the Maho- 
metan empire may produce ultimately in the Mediterranean, I know 
not ; but I would lay a wager we are not at war before Christmas. 
I offer you a bet of five shillings to that effect ; if you think this 
venture indiscreetly large, Georgiana will, I dare say, take half. 

We are at Sidmouth. It is extremely beautiful, but quite de- 
serted. I have nothing to do but to look out of window, and am 
ennuied. The events which have turned up are, a dog and a mon- 
key for a show and a morning concert ; and I rather think we shall 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 619 

have an invitation to tea. I say to every one who sits near me on the 
marine benches, that it is a fine day, and that the prospect is beauti- 
ful ; but we get no further. I can get no water out of a dry rock. 

There arrived, the other day, at New York, a Sydney Smith/ A 
meeting was called, and it was proposed to tar-and-feather him ; 
but the amendment was carried, that he should be invited to a 
public dinner. He turned out to be a journeyman cooper ! My 
informant encloses for me an invitation from the Bishop of the 
diocese to come and see him, and a proposition that we should 
travel together to the Falls of Niagara! Ever, dear Lady Grey, 
affectionately yours, Sydney Smith. 

556.] To the Countess Grey. 

No date. 

I should say, my dear Lady Grey, that, upon the whole, the 
O'Connell business has not ended unfavourably. The Government 
has not done anything shabby or timid, but, on the contrary, has 
acted with spirit. They have been badly served by their law- 
servants, but that is not their fault. The evil will not end, nor the 
business be settled without a battle. 

Read travels in the East, called " Eothen." They are by a Mr 
Kinglake, of Taunton, a chancery barrister, and are written in a 
lively manner. They will amuse Lord Grey, who, I presume, is 
read to regularly every day. 

God bless you, dear Lady Grey ! Kind regards to Lord Grey, of 
whom I am in weekly hopes of receiving a better account. 

Sydney Smith. 

557.] To his Excellency M. Van de Weyer. 

Combe Florey, Sept. 17, 1844. 
Dear Van de Weyer, 

Many thanks for your proffered loan of the book from which you 
took the letters you were so good as to send me, of Alva and Philip ; 
but as I never return books, I make a rule never to borrow them. 
I shall send the title of the work you have been so kind as to men- 
tion to my authoress, and of course there can be no objection to her 
printing a quotation from the printed work. I have not mentioned 
your name. I shall not trouble you for any further information on 
this topic, because I must extricate myself from this lady, who 
(though clever, and in a situation perfectly independent) I am afraid 
will bore me. You have so recently suffered this alarm from me, 
that you will, I am sure, understand how I should fall into similar 
apprehensions. 

I am very sorry you have been and are unwell ; you have had 

* See Memoir, Chapter VIII. 



620 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

loo much to do. I am (in common with many other gentlemen in 
orders) suffering from the very opposite cause. 

Rumours of wars reach me on every side ; my only confidence 
is, that the Governments on both sides of the water wish for peace. 

We are expecting Mrs , who perhaps has never oc- 
curred to you in a rural point of view. I remain, my dear Sir, 
very truly yours, Sydney Smith. 

558.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe F/orey, Sept. 25, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey, 

Lord Grey understands these matters better than I do, but I do 
not see how the reversal of O'Connell's sentence can injure, morally, 
the House of Lords. It was (I have no doubt) the honest decision 
of the majority of those who, from their legal habits, and attention 
to the case, had a right to decide ; and that the lay lords abstained 
from voting was surely an act of honesty. It shows, however, the 
absurd constitution of a court of justice, where ninety-nine of the 
hundred judges are utterly incapable of forming any just opinion of 
the subject. 

I mean to write a pamphlet upon the payment of the Catholic 
and Presbyterian clergy in Ireland ; the honest payment — without 
any attempt to gain power over them. Their refusal to take it is 
no conclusive objection, and they would take it a fioco a ftoco, if it 
were nonestly given. We must have a regular Ambassador resid- 
ing at the Court of Rome; patronage must be divided with an even 
hand between Catholic and Protestant ; all their alleged wrongs 
about land must be impartially examined, and, if just, be speedily 
redressed ; a large army be kept ready for immediate action, and 
the law be put in force against O'Connell and O'Connellism, in 
spite of all previous failures. Will Lord Grey or Howick dissent 
from these obvious principles ? 

Adieu, dear Lady Grey ! Sydney Smith. 



559.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey, Oct. 5, 1844* 
My dear Lady Grey, 

I had a smart attack of giddiness on Tuesday, which alarmed me 
a good deal. The doctor said it was stomach, and has put me 
under the most rigid rules ; I will try to follow them. 

I think " Ireland and its Leaders " worth reading, and beg of 
you to tell me who wrote it, if you happen to know ; for though you 
call yourself solitary, you live much more in the world than I do, 
while in the country. 



LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 621 

Have you noticed the abuse of St Paul's in the " Times" ? I was 
moved to write, but I kept silence, though it was pain and grief 
tome. Read Captain Marryat's " Settlers in Canada." 

Sydney Smith. 

560.] To the Countess Grey. 

Combe Florey. Oct. 11, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I rather think that last week they wanted to kill me, but I w.is 
too sharp for them. I am now tolerably well, but I am weak, and 
taking all proper care of myself ; which care consists in eating no- 
thing that I like, and doing nothing that I wish. 1 sent you yes- 
terday the triumph of a fellow-sufferer with Lord Grey. Tell me 
fairly the effect such a narrative produces upon him. The greatest 
consolation to me is, to find that others are suffering as much as I 
do. I would not inflict suffering upon them; I would contri- 
bute actively to prevent it ; but if it do come after this, I must 
confess . . . Always affectionately yours, Sydney Smith. 

I shall be in London the 22d and 25th. 
See what rural life is : — 

Combe Florey Gazette. 

Mr Smith's large red cow is expected to calve this week. 

Mr Gibbs has bought Mr Smith's lame mare. 

It rained yesterday, and, a correspondent observes, is not unlikely to rain to-day. 

Mr Smith is better. 

Mrs Smith is indisposed. 

A nest of black magpies was found near the village yesterday. 



561.] To Dr Holland. 

Combe Florey, October, 1 844. 
My dear Holland, 
I cannot let this post pass over without thanking you for one of 
the very best letters I ever read, to say nothing of its great kindness. 
It is a tolerably good day with me to-day ; Lyddon says my pulse 
is better, but I am very weak ; I think also my breathing is better. 
I rather lean to coming up to London. Yours affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 

564,] To Dr Holland. 

Combe Florey, 1844, 
Scale of Dining. 

Gruel. Panada. 

Broih. Mutton-chop. 

Pudding. Roast and boiled. 

Pear Holland, — I am only at broth at present, but Lyddon 



622 LETTERS OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 

thinks I shall get to pudding to-morrow, and mutton-chops the 
next day. I long for promotion. Yours affectionately, 

Sydney Smith. 



565.] To the Countess of Carlisle. 

56 Green Street, Oct. 21, 1844. 
My dear Lady Carlisle, 

From your ancient goodness to me, I am sure you will be glad 
to receive a bulletin from myself, informing you that I am making 
a good progress ; in fact, I am in a regular train of promotion : 
from gruel, vermicelli, and sago, I was promoted to panada, from 
thence to minced meat, and (such is the effect of good conduct) I 
was elevated to a mutton-chop. My breathlessness and giddiness 
are gone — chased away by the gout. If you hear of sixteen or 
eighteen pounds of human flesh, they belong to me. I look as if a 
curate had been taken out of me. I am delighted to hear such 
improved accounts of my fellow-sufferer at Castle Howard. Lady 

is severe in her medical questions ; but I detail the most 

horrible symptoms, at which she takes flight. 

Accept, my dear Lady Carlisle, my best wishes for Lord Carlisle 
and all the family. SYDNEY SMITH. 



566.] To the Countess Grey. 

56 Green Street \ Nov. 7, 1844. 
My dear Lady Grey, 
I have been seriously ill, and I do not think I am yet quite 
" clear of the wood," but am certainly a good deal better. My 
complaints have been giddiness, breathlessness, and weakness of 
the digestive o.-gans. I believe I acted wisely in setting off for 
Lor don on the first attack; it has secured for me the proximity 
and best attentions of Dr Holland, and the use of a comfortable 
house, where a suite of rooms are perfectly fitted up for illness and 
death. 

I have a great notion you can send me better accounts of Lord 
Grey ; — pray do, and give him my earnest and sincere regard. 

Sydney Smith. 



List of the Rev. Syd?iey Smith's Articles in the 
Edinburgh Review. 



\TdL 


Art 


Page 


Vol. 


Art. 


Page 


Vol. 


Art. 


Page 




2 


18 


12 


9 


151 


32 


6 


389 




3 


24 


13 


2 


25 


33 


3 


68 




9 


83 


13 


5 


77 


33 


5 


9i 




12 


94 


13 


4 


333 


34 


5 


109 




16 


"3 


H 


3 


40 


34 


2 


320 




18 


122 


H 


11 


145 


34 


8 


422 




20 


128 


14 


5 


353 


35 


5 


92 




6 


314 


H 


13 


490 


35 


7 


123 




IO 


382 


15 


3 


40 


35 


2 


2S6 


2 


2 


30 


15 


3 


299 


36 


6 


no 


2 


4 


53 


16 


7 


158 


36 


3 


353 


2 




86 


16 


3 


326 


37 


2 


325 


2 


H 


136 


16 


7 


399 


37 


7 


432 


2 


17 


172 


17 


4 


330 


38 


4 


85 


2 


22 


202 


17 


8 


393 


39 


2 


43 


2 


2 


287 


18 


3 


325 


39 


2 


299 


2 


4 


33o 


21 


4 


93 


40 


2 


31 


2 


10 


398 


22 


4 


67 


40 


7 


427 


3 


12 


146 


23 


8 


189 


41 


7 


143 


3 


7 


334 


31 


2 


44 


42 


4 


367 


3 


9 


355 


31 


6 


132 


43 


2 


299 


9 


12 


177 


31 


2 


295 


43 


7 


395 


10 


4 


299 


32 


2 


28 


44 


2 


47 


10 


6 


329 


32 


3 


309 


45 


3 


74 


ii 


5 


34i 


32 


6 


ill 


45 


7 


m 


12 


5 


82 















INDEX. 



Absence of mind, 234, 235. 

Abstraction, power of, 89. 

Alien, Mr, recommei dation of, to Lord 
Holland, 32; lert.rs to, 310, 316, 324, 
327, 346-349. 356» 359* 360, 383, 385, 
386, 398, 435, 457, 481, 500. 

Amalgams, moral, 147. 

America, reported visit to, 199. 

Animals, interest in, 91, 123 ; medicine ad- 
ministered to, 91 ; scratcher for, 91. 

Apologue on Toleration, 149 ; letter of Mr 
Everett relating to the authorship of, 
149. 

Apothecary s shop, 230, 252. 

Apreece, Mrs (Lady Davy), letter to, 343. 

Arms of the Smith family, 163. 

Artist's widow, the, 123. 

Ashburton, Lady, letters to, 531, 532, 554, 
570. 597- % 

Austin's (Mrs) account of sermon at St 
Paul's, 201, 202. 

Ballot, pamphlet on the, 211. 

Banker, dining with a, 252. 

Baring, Mrs, letters to, 506, 507. 

Beach, Mr and Mrs, letters addressed to, 

9-32, 57-62 ; engage Sydney Smith as 

tutor to eldest son, 8 ; to second son, 

27 ; request him to choose a governess, 

24. 

Bedford, , letter to, 471. 

Belgium, visit to, 168, 169 ; interview with 

the King, 169. 
Bell, Lady, letter to, 583. 
Benevolence, fragment on, 100. 
Bennett, Lady Mary, letters to, 371, 375- 

377, 379. 3 8 3. 4<M> 4"i 4*3, 425, 428- 

43*. 
Berkeley Chapel, morning preachership at, 

69. 
Berry, Miss, Ode erroneously attributed 

to, 72 ; visit to, 175 ; letters to, 407, 

538, 582, 585, 588, 594, 602. 
Bible names, 226. 
Birth and ancestry, 1, 2. 
Bishop, duties of a, 159 ; marriage of a, 

171. 
Bishop of London, letter from, to Sydney 

Smith, 596. 
Bishopric, views with regard to a, 157-159 ; 

probability of elevation to, 163. 
Bishopthorpe, visit to, 124, 125. 
Blind, sermon for the, 52, 53. 
Blinds, coloured patchwork, 125. 



Bobus. See Smith, Robert. 

Body, the, a fragment on, 96. 

Books, love of, 126, 161. 

Bristol, becomes Canon of, 147 ; sermon at 
the Cathedral on the 5th of November, 
148; popularity at, 155; riots at, 155. 

Bulteel, Lady Elizabeth, letter to, 491. 

Bunch, 114, 125, 130, 136, 228. 

Bunter, Mrs, letter to, 512. 

Business habits, 90, 91, 244, 252. 

Calamity, horse so named, 122, 123. 

Carlisle, Lady, lines by, 215 ; letters to, 
504» 543, 549, 555. 577, 607, 615, 617, 
618, 622. 

Carlisle, Lord, commencement of friend- 
ship of, 119 ; frequent visits of, at 
Foston, 119. 

Catholic Emancipation, petition for, 139 ; 
speech at Beverley in favour of, 139. 

Cheerfulness, remarks on, 99. 

Chess, 146. 

Chester, letter to the Dean of, 460. 

Children, fondness for, 89, 93, 228, 258 ; ia« 
terest in the pursuits of, 89, 185. 

Chimneys, smoky, 91. 

Cholera, spread of the, 161. 

Christianity, evidences of, 50 ; tolerant 
spirit of, 50, 51. 

Christmas day at Combe Florey, 254. 

Church, state of the, 34. 

Classes of society, 244, 245. 

Clergyman, poor, living presented to a, 261. 

Club, the. 76. 

Cockerell, Mr, letter from, on performance 
of duties as Canon of St Paul's, 165. 

Combe Florey, removal to, 153 ; rebuilds 
parsonage-house. 154 ; visit of Lord 
Jeffrey, 155 ; library at, 160, 161 ; visit 
of Lord John Russell, 161 ; mode of 
life at, 216 ; Christmas day at, 254 ; 
sermon at, 255 ; last return to, 258 ; the 
" Combe Florey Gazette," 621. 

Composition, rapid, habit of, 88. 

Contributions to Edinburgh Review, list of, 
623. 

Court, presentation at, 151. 

Courtenay Smith, death of, 186. 

Crewe, Lord, letter to, 440. 

Crowe, Mrs, letters to, 552, 561. 

Curacy on Salisbury Plain, 6. 

Dandy, thawing a, 127. 

Dante, tortures described by, tfC 



INDEX. 



625 



Davenport, Edward, letters to, 374, 405,407, 
415, 417, 420, 423, 437, 438, 440, 453. 

Davy, Lady, visit of, 112; letters 10, 343, 
380. 382, 541, 556, 565, 576. 

Dean of Chester, letter to, 460. 

Deer, parsonic, 224. 

Delinquents, juvenile, 118. 

Denman, Lord, 229 ; letter to, 58a 

Diary, portions of, 93-96. 

Dickens, Charles, letters to, 547, 572, 584, 
589, 608. 

Dining out in the country, 108. 

Dinners, importance of, 222, 223. 

Dogs, dislike of, 139, 233. 

Donkey, a favourite, in. 

Douglas Smith, birth of, 59 ; sent to West- 
minster School, 127; goes to Oxford, 
137 ; death, 153 ; letter to Lady Wen- 
lock relating to his death, 153. 

Dryden's house, 176. 

Dud ey, Lord, his absence of mind, 234 ; 
anecdotes of, 235. 

Dufferin, Lady, letter to, 593. 

Ecclesiastical Commission, contest with 

the, 179. 
Ecclesiastical Duties and Revenues Bill, 

petition against, 180, 181. 
Economy practised, 141, 217. 
Edgewonh, Miss, visit of, to London, 203 ; 

letter from, 203 ; conversation of, 251, 

Edinburgh, journey to, o-n ; society at, 

12 ; lodgings, 13 ; residence at, 14, 54, 

251. 
Edinburgh Review, origin of, 33 ; state of 

society at the establishment of, 33; 

moral courage in contributing to, 34 ; 

character of writings in, 37-41 ; Sydney 

Smith ceases to write for, 155 ; publi- 
cation of his contributions to, 155, 183; 

list of contributions to, 623. 
Editorial Preface to Letters of Sydney 

Smith, 273. 
Edmonton, the living of, 191 ; address of 

parishioners, 192 ; letter to the Bishop 

of London relating to, 193. 
Education, 38 ; importance of religious, 51 ; 

views on, 9, 208, 218, 226, 232 ; female, 

hints on, 265. 
Egerton, Lord Francis, letter to, 573. 
Ellenborough, Lord, anecdote of the late, 

241. 
Epitaph to Sydney Smith, 269. 
Erasmus, life of, 207.', 
Everett, Mr, visit of, 258. 
Exchange of living, efforts to obtain, 86, 

in, 112. 
Extract from the "Taunton Courier," letter 

to Mr Bunter, 512. 
Extract from the "Times," a Protest, 489. 

Fallacies, remarks on, 232, 233. 
Fanshawe, Miss C, Ode by, on buying a 

new bonnet, 72. 
Farmers, annual dinner to, 90. 
Fazakerly, N., letter to, 476. 
Female education, hints on, 265, 
Fi'ial affection, instance of, 131. 
Fire-places, importance of, 173. 
Fishmongers' Hall, reply to an invitation 

to dine at, 84. 



Fletcher, Mrs, letter to, 459. 

Fletcher, , letter to, 444. 

F.oweis, love of, 171. 

Foundling Ho-pital, appointed to the 
prcachership of the, 63 ; anecdote, 76, 

77- 

Foston-le-Clay, obtains the living of, 81 ; 
induciion, 81 ; conversation at tie 
Archbishop's, 81 ; compelled to reside 
on living, 85 ; resolves to build, 86 ; 
commences building, 114 ; house com- 
pleted, 116; the household, 116, 117, 
126; account of a visit, by a clergy- 
man, 143, 144 ; Mr Loch's opinion of 
the parsonage-house, 154 ; revisited, 
186. 

Fox, Colonel, letters to, 484, 532. 

Fox, Miss, 164, 218; letter to, 479. 

Franklin, admiration of, 228. 

French, remarks on the, 16, 173, 226, 232. 

Friendship, remarks on, 98, 99. 

Fry, Mrs, a visit with, to Newgate, 118. 

Game Laws, 39, 117, 118. 

Garden chair, 235 ; lines on receiving, 214, 
215. 

Gardens for the poor, 92. 

Grandchild, letter to his, 602. 

Grattan, Mr, death of, 132 ; character of, 
132. 133. 

Gray, Jonathan, letter to, 475. 

Grenville, Right Hon. Sir Thomas, letter 
from, 534. 

Grenville, Mr, old age of, 174, 237 ; letter 
from, 189. 

Grey, Lord, first visit to, 84; fall of his ad- 
ministration, 163 ; proposed inscription 
for monument to, 183; letters to, 313, 
322. 334, 336, 345. 385, 387. 390. 394. 
403, 406, 408, 409, 443, 459, 493. 

Grey, Countess, letters to, 333, 337, 338, 
367, 377, 391-393. 395. 396. 400. 4°!. 
416, 420, 421, 423, 424, 432, 434, 438. 
439. 442, 443. 456, 465. 466, 472, 474. 
479, 481, 485-487. 489-494. 496-49 8 . 
503. 505-510. 518, 522, 527. 537, 540, 
543. 545. 549. 558, 561, 565. 567, 57L 
573, 576, 580, 581, 583, 586, 593, 595, 
598, 608-610, 612, 613, 617-622. 

Grote, Mrs, letters to, 547, 548, 550, 559, 
564, 567, 590, 592, 599, 600, 604, 606, 
615. 

Handwriting, badness of, 134, 135. 

Happiness, recipe for, 194. 

Harcourt, Miss G., letters to, 542, 565, 566, 

rT 573. 574, 586, 611. 

Hardness of character, 194. 

Harvest, failure of, in 1816, 121. 

Hatherton, Lord, letters to, 148, 559. 

Heroism of women, 243. 

Heslington, residence at, 87; mode of life 
at, 87 ; visits of friends, 106. 

Hints, historical, 103. 

Holland House, first visit to, 68 ; society 
at, 68. 

Holland, Dr, attendance of, in last illness, 
258, 259 ; letters to, 513, 616, 621. 

Holland, Lord, friendship of, 68, 78 ; letter 
from, relating to Plymley's Letters, 83, 
322 ; visits Foston, 122 ; offers the 
living of Ampthill, 124 ; letter to, rela- 

2 R 



026 



INDEX. 



tivc to a bishoprici 158 ; death of, 186; 
portrait of, 1S7 ; letters to, 3 
3 6 7» 372, 4i°> 44i» 456, tfrh 468, 502, 
55»- 
Holland, Lady, lotters to, 302-305, 308, 309, 
3^4, 3*5, 318-321, 326, 328-331, 333, 

334. 339» 34i. 342, 348, 355, 360, 362. 
3631 367-369. 374. 379. 388, 435, 436, 
44i> 455- 457, 462, 466, 470, 474, 480, 
487, 4S8, 499, 511, 519, 525, 538, 544, 
55i. 554, 560, 579, 582, 584- 

Holland, Mrs, letters to, 508, 513, 520, 524, 
583, 6or, 605, 606. 

Holland, tour in, 168, 169. 

Horner, L., first acquaintance with, 23 ; 
character of, 23, 120; removal to Lon- 
don, 75 ; declining health and death, 
120 ; letter to, 413. 

Horner, Francis, letters to, 120, 369, 370. 

Howard, Henry, letters to, 467, 479. 

Howard, Philip, letter to, 464. 

Horton, Sir Wilmot, letters to, 509, 516, 
525, 528, 531. 

Humour, instances of want of perception 
of, 107, 177, 236. 

Hunt, trial of, 131, 132. 

"Immortal," the, 115, 118, 145, 146. 

Immortality, evidence of, 49. 

Impertinence, official, 135. 

Industry, remark on, 209. 

Innocence vindicated, 163, 164. 

Ireland, condition of, 83 ; sketch of English 

misrule in, 105. 
Irreligion, abhorrence of, 142. 
Italian refugee, marriage of an, at Foston, 

124. 

Jeffrey, Lord, visit of, at Heslington, 
109, in ; lines on, in ; visit to, at 
Edinburgh, 134 ; letters to, on the 
principles of the Edinburgh Review, 
142 ; visit to Combe Florey, 155 ; Syd- 
ney Smith's regard for, 251 ; letters 
from, during last illness, 262 ; letters 
relating to Memoir, 262 ; letters to, 
285-296, 298-301, 303, 306, 307, 310- 
312, 314, 316, 317, 319, 324-326, 332, 

335. 340, 341, 344, 346, 351. 353. 357. 
361, 365, 366, 382, 384, 390, 396, 397, 
399, 401, 410, 414, 417, 419, 422, 426, 
427, 438, 439. 442, 444, 454, 458, 470. 

Johnson, Dr, anecdote of, 90. 

Journal of a Lady, 206 ; of a Scotch friend, 
251. 

Justice, love of, 37, 158. 

Justice of the Peace, Sydney Smith be- 
comes a, 117. 

Kay, Annie, 116, 128, 231, 259. 
Kemble, anecdote of, 21. 
Kinglake, Arthur, letter to, 539. 

Labels, doctors' 241. 

Lectures, extracts from, 42, 43 ; delivery 

of, at the Royal Institution, 70 ; public 

interest excited by, 70, 71. 
Legacy from Aunt Mary, 134. 
Lemons, store of, 230, 231. 

Letter to Messrs , booksellers, 46a. 

Letters to Misa , 437, 514. 



Letters to Mrs , 511, 516, 518, 521, 523, 

529, 53i» 539, 55i, 553, 558, 562, 563, 

568, 581, 605. 
Leyden, Mr, generosity to, 29. 
Liberal opinions, advocacy of, 35, 36 ; 

penalties attending, 36. 
Liberty, views respecting, 35. 
License for a chapel, efforts to obtain, 63; 

correspondence relating to, 63-C7. 
Life, how usually spent, 208. 
Londesborough, living of, 141. 
London, removal to, 59 ; society in, 60, 67, 

74, 170, 171. 
London, letter from the Bishop of, 596. 
Longevity, 207. 

Lucan, a copy of, sent to Mr Grenville, 189. 
Luttrell, Mr, visit of, 240. 
Lyndhurst, Lord, visit of, 131 ; promotion 

by, 147 ; renewed kindness of, 153. 
Lyndhurst, Lady, letter to, 466. 

Macaulay, Mr, letter from, on English 
misrule in Ireland, 105 ; opinion of',234. 

Mackintosh, Sir J., anecdote of, 75; return 
of, from India, 109 ; visit of, at Hes- 
lington, 109 ; at Foston, 136 ; Sydney 
Smith's regard for, 136, 162 ; death of, 
162 ; character, 162 ; correspondence 
with, 162 ; remarks on, 245, 247 ; imi- 
tation of a speech of, 248. 

Mahon, Lord, letter to, 589. 

Manners, on the neglect of as a part of 
education, 232. 

Marcet, Dr and Mrs, visit of, 128 ; inci- 
dents related by Mrs Marcet, 128, 130, 
216 ; letter from, 193. 

Marion de Lorme, letter of, 246. 

Marriage, 27, 28 ,* of an Irish widow, 223 ; 
office for, 227 ; definition of, 234., 

Maxims and rules of life, 93. 

Medicine, study and practice of, 55, 56, 91, 
166, 230. 

Melancholy, remedy for, 249. 

Meynell, Mrs, letters to, 418, 419, 421, 424, 
427. 430, 433, 437, 461, 477, 478, 482, 
483, 485, 49i, 494, 501, 5°4> 505, 546, 
55i, 554, 560, 563, 569- 579- 59 1 - 

Mildmay, Master Humphrey, letter to, 536. 

Milnes, R. Monckton, letters to, 541, 562, 
. 563, 597- 

Mind, the, a fragment on, 102, 103. 

Missions, opinion of, 241. 

Mithoffer, a German courier, 13, 15, 23. 

Moore, 'f ., visit of, 189 ; letters from, 189- 
191 ; requested to write Memoir, 263. 

Moral philosophy, study of, 56 ; lectures 
on, 70. 

Morley, Countess of, letters to, 473, 495, 
502, 558, 602, 604 ; letter from, 603. 

Murchison, Roderick, letters to, 546, 557, 
571, 586, 588. 

Murchison, Mrs, letters to, 529, 538. 

Murray, John, letters to, 328, 342, 354-356, 
374, 412, 425, 469, 476, 480, 483- 488, 
500, 504, 507, 526, 533, 568, 578, 588. 

Murray's (Lord) sketch of Sydney Smith, 
213 ; letters to, 523, 595, 597-599- 

Music, remark on, 248, 249. 

Netherhaven, curacy of, 6 ; life at, 6, 7 ; 

school of industry, 8. 
New Zealand, advice to a Bishop of, 235. 



INDEX. 



627 



Newton, Sir Isaac, an ancestor, 2. 
Nice person, definition of a, 137. 
North Pole, Jeffrey and the, 20. 

Occupation, incessant, 87 ; essay on, 97. 
Olier, Miss, character of, 2, 3. 
Opinions, moderation of, 34, 35 ; liberal, 
penalties for, 34. 

Parts, visit to, T41. 
Parish-clerk at Foston, 85. 
Parishioners, advice to. 220. 
Parsonage-house at Foston, account of 

building the, 114; removal to, 116; at 

Combe Florey, 154. 
Partington, Mrs, 161. 
Paul's, St, becomes Canon of, 161 ; letter 

from Mr Cockerell relating to Canonry, 

165 ; remarks of the Dean, 168. 
Peasantry, significance of words used by 

the, 223. 
Peel, Sir Robert, correspondence with, 204- 

206. 
"Peter the Cruel," 87, 91. 
Philips, Sir George, visit to, 118 ; letters to, 

478, 482, 501, 526, 529, 530, 533, 537, 

542, 545. 572, 575. 578, 59i, 600. 
Philips, George, Esq., letters to, 373, 523. 
Pictures, purchase of, 79 ; appreciation of, 

177, 178. 
Plymley's Letters, appearance of, 82 ; pub- 
lic interest in, 82 ; letter from Lord 

Holland relating to, 83. 
Poor, sympathy with the, 7, 8, 17, 228, 251, 

252. 
Pope, parody on, 241. 
Preachingat St Paul's, impression produced 

by, 201, 202 ; at Combe Florey, 255. 
Preferment, letters on, 157-159. 
Procter, Mrs, letter to, 564. 
Promotion, hopes of, 143 ; letter on, 143 ,' 

becomes Canon of Bristol, 147 ', and 

Canon of St Paul's 161. 
Protest, a, extract from the "Times," 489. 
Pybus, Miss, marriage to, 27, 28. 

Quaker, roasting, 108 ; baby, 225. 
Quakers, heroic conduct of, 122. 

Raven, anecdote of a, 207. 

Reading, rapid, habit of, 88. 

Reeve, Dr, letters to, 296, 307. 

Religious views, 49. 

Repudiation, American, 195 ; Mr Ticknor's 

letter on, 196. 
Residence Bill, effects of the passing of the, 

. . 8 4> 8 5- 

Riding, unskilful, 122, 125. 

Robin, M., article by, in the "Revue des 
Deux Mondes," 256 ; correspondence 
relating to, 256-258 ; letter to, 614. 

Rogers, Mr, visits Foston, 122 ; illness of, 
136. 

Roman legions and cohorts, letter regard- 
ing a disquisition upon, 463, 464. 

Romilly, Sir S., visit of, at Heslington, 
106 ; sermon on the death of, 106, 
107. 

Royal Institution, lectures at the, on Moral 
Philosophy, 70. 

Russell, Lord John, letter to, 158 ; reply 
of, 158 ; letter to, 535. 



Salad, recipe for, 240. 

Scotch, regard for the, 17 ; peculiarities of 
the, 16-18. 

Scratcher, the universal, 91. 

Screaming gate, the, 226. 

Sermons, preface to, 43-49 ; characteristics 
of, 51-54 J effect produced by, 69 : pub- 
lishes two volumes of, 86; preached at 
York, 138. 

SeVigne", Madame de, 241. 

Shaking hands, lesson on, 227. 

Sharp, R., letter to, 515. 

Sheridan, dining with, 237. 

Shooting, objections to, 106. 

Shopping, 124. 

Shyness, 173, 236. 

Siddons, Mrs, 78, 242. 

Singing, fondness for, 146. 

Singleton, Archdeacon, letter from, 534, 

Sister, death of, 120. 

Sketches, a few unfinished, 96. 

Skiddaw, ascent of, 10. 

Smith, Douglas, letter to, 402. 

Smith, Robert, return of, from India, 109 ; 
remarkable conversational powers of, 
no; Indian fame of, no; visit of, at 
Heslington, no; illness, no; visit to 
his brother during last illness, 260; 
death, 260 ; noble character, 260 ; lines 
written by, 261 ; letters to, 350, 352. 

Smith, Robert, sen., singular character of, 
1, 2 ; visits to, 7, 132. 

Smith, Sydney, birth and ancestry, 1, 2 ; 
early character, 3 ; school days at 
Winchester, 4; goes to Oxford, 5; re- 
sidence in France, 5 ; college life, 5, 6; 
choice of a profession, 6 ; becomes a 
curate on Salisbury Plain, 6 ; engaged 
as tutor by Mr Beach, 8, 27, 54; ar- 
rival at Edinburgh, n ; marriage, 27, 
28 ; his fortune, 28 ; early housekeep- 
ing, 28 ; generosity, 29 ; birth of daugh- 
ter, 32 ; moral courage, 34 ; freedom 
from crude opinions, 34, 35 ; illness of 
daughter, 55 ; studies medicine, 56 ; 
quits Edinburgh, 58; birth of son, 59; 
removal to London, 59; cheerfulness, 
78, 152; obtains the rectory of Foston, 
81 ; removes to Sonning, 82 ; compelled 
to reside on living, 85 ; leaves London, 
86 ; removes to Heslington, 86 ; visits 
London, 109 ; generosity of character, 
109, no, 125, 261 ; commences building, 
114 ; birth of second son, 115 ; removal 
to Foston, 116 ; the living of Ampthill 
offered, 124 ; visits Edinburgh, 127, 
134 ; visit to his brother in London, 
134 ; improved circumstances, 141 ; 
visits Paris, 141 ; hopes of promotion, 
143 ; marriage of youngest daughter, 
147 ; becomes Canon of Bristol, 147 ; 
resigns Foston, and removes to Combe 
Florey, 153 ; ceases writing for the 
Edinburgh Review, 155 ; publishes his 
contributions, 155, 183 ; marriage of 
eldest daughter, 162 ; christens grand- 
daughter, 164 ; takes a house in Lon- 
don, 165 ; revisits Paris, 165 ; frag- 
ments of conversation, 171-178 ; return 
to Combe Florey, 185 ; unexpected 
wealth, 186; mode of life at Combe 
Florey, 216, 248, 252 ; habits of study, 



623 



INDEX. 



23S ; goes to the seaside, 25Q ; last re- 
turn to London. 259; last illness, 259; 
anxiety of friends, 259 ; visit of his 
brother Robot, 260 ; death, 261. 

Smith, Mrs Sydney, letter from, to Lord 
Jeffrey, ^30; letters to, 445-454. 

Somersetshire, climate of, 224. 

Squire, a country, 113. 

Stael, Madamede, visits England, 109, no; 
becomes acquainted with Mr Robert 
Smith, no. 

Stewart, Dugald, death of, 178. 

Stomach-pump, 231. 

Stowell, Lord, 84. 

Study, plans of, 88. 

Style, beauty of, 218. 

Suppers, weekly, 74; the country cousin, 

c • 75 \ 

Swing, letters to, 159. 

Tallevrand, anecdote of, 3; acquaintance 
formed with, 142 ; conversation of, 169 ; 
opinion of his wit, 170. 

Taunton, speech at county meeting held at, 
156; effect produced by, 157. 

Taylor, Jeremy, Apologue by, on Tolera- 
tion, 149. 

Tea-kettle of boiling water, 173. 

Thomson, Mrs (Lady Wenlock), letter to, 
relating to the death of his son, 
153- 

Ticknor, Mr, letter of, on American repu- 
diation, 196. 

Toleration, 50, 51 ; sermon on, in the 
Temple Church, 77 ; and in the Cathe- 
dral at Bristol, 147, 148 ; Taylor's apo- 
logue in illustration of, 149* 



Travelling, incidents of, 187, 128. 
Translator of Voltaire's "Charles XII.," 

letter to, 460. 
Turtle, stroking a, 178 ; riding on a, 255. 

Utilitarians, 218. 

Van de Weyer, M., 168 ; letters to, 200, 
air, 212, 540, 615, 619; visit of, 211 ; 
letter from, relating to M. Robin, 256. 

Visitation sermon, 125. 

Voltaire's "Charles XII.," letter to the 
translator of. 460. 

Vulgarity, freedom fom, 41. 

Volunteers, sermon to, 62. 

Wainwright, Rev. J. M , of New York, 

letter from, 199. 
Wales, tour in, 21. 
Wealth, views of, 152, 255. 
Webster, Mr Daniel, correspondence with, 

187. 188. 
Wenlock, Lady, letters to, 153, 432, 575. 
Whewell, Dr, letter to, 587. 
Whishaw, Mr, letter to, on the death of 

Horner, 121 ; letters to, 372, 378, 381, 

555- 
Winchester School, 4. 
Writings, character and subjects of his, 37- 

41. 

York, His Grace the Archbishop of, letter 
to, 590. 

York, residence in a village near, 86 ; nar- 
rowness of the streets of, 87 ; the as- 
sizes at, 131. 138 ; the sermons preached 
at the Cathedral, 138. 



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INDEX 



ACTOX's Modern Cookery 23 

Ainu's Blackstone Economised SS 

Alpine Club Map of Switzerland 24 

Alpine Guide (The! 24 

Ai.thaus' Medical Electricity 1" 

AMOS's Jurisprudence 6 

Primer of the Const. tution 6 

Anderson's Strength of Materials 13 

Armstrong's Organic Chemistry 13 

Arnold's Manual of English Literature ... 8 

Arxould'S Life of Denman 4 

Atherstone Priory 25 

Authority and Conscience 22 

Autumn Holidays of a Country Parson 9 

Ayrk's Treasury of Bible Knowledge 22 

Bacon's Essays, by Whately 6 

Life and Letters, by Spf.dding 6 

Works, edited by Speddixg 6 

BAIN'S Logic, Deductive and Inductive 10 

Mental and Moral Science 10 

on the Senses and Intellect 10 

Ball's Alpine Guide 24 

Bayldox'S Rents and Tillages 20 

Bkcker'S Charicles mid Callus 25 

Bexfey's Sanskrit Dictionary 8 

Black's Treatise on Brewing 28 

Blackley's German-English Dictionary... 9 

Blaine's Rural Sports 27 

Bloxams Metals 13 

Boase & Courtney's Bibliotheca Cornu- 

biensis 4 

BOULTBEE on 39 Articles 21 

Boubxe's Catechism of the Steam Engine . 20 

Handbook of Steam Engine 20 

Improvements in the Steam 

Engine 20 

Treatise on the Steam Engine ... 20 

Bowdler's Family Shakspeare 26 

BRAMLEY-MOORE'S Six Sisters of the 

Valleys 25 

Braxde'S Dictionary of Science, Litera- 
ture, and Art 16 

BRAY'S Manual of Anthropology 11 

Philosophy of Necessity 10 

on Force 10 

Brenchley's Cruise of H.M.S. Curacoa ... 24 

Brinkley's Astronomy ll 

Browne's Exposition of the 39 Articles 21 

BRUXEL'SLifeofBRTJXEL 5 

Buckle's History of Civilization 3 

Miscellaneous Writings 9 

Bull's Hints to Mothers 28 

Maternal Management of Children 28 

Bunsex's Prayers 21 

Burgomaster's Family (The) 25 

Burke's Rise of Great Families 5 

Vicissitudes of Families 5 

Burtox'R Christian Church 3 

Busk's Folk-Lore of Rome 24 



Cabinet Lawyer 28 

Campbell's Norway 24 

Cates's Biographical Dictionary 5 

and Woodward's Encyclopaedia 4 

Cats' and Farlie's Moral Emblems 18 

Changed Aspects of Unchanged Truths 9 

Chesney's Indian Polity 3 

Modern Military Biography ... 4 

Waterloo Campaign a 

Christ the Consoler 21 

Clough'S Lives from Plutarch 9 

Codringtox's (Admiral) Memoir 5 

Colenso (Bishop) on Pentateuch 22 

on Moabite Stone, &c 22 

on Speaker's Bible Commentary 21 

Collixs's Perspective in 

Colomb's Slave Catching 23 

Commonplace Philosopher, by A.K.H.B. ... 9 

Comyn's Elena 24 

Coxgrkve's Politics of Aristotle 6 

Connixgton's Translation of the sEneid... 26 

Miscellaueous Writings 9 

Contaxseau'8 French-English Diction- 
aries g 

Coxybeare and Howsox's St. Paul l 

Cooke's Grotesque Animals is 

Coplaxd's Dictionary of Practical Medicine 17 

Cottox's (Bishop) Memoir 5 

Counsel and Comfort from a City Pulpit 9 

Cox'S Aryan Mythology 3 

Crusades 4 

History of Greece 2 

Tale of the Great Persian War 2 

Tales of Ancient Greece 25 

Cox and Joxes'S Popular Romances 25 

Tales of Teutonic Lands 25 

Crawley's Thucydides 3 

Creasy on British Constitutions 3 

Cresy'S Encyclopaedia of Civil Engineer- 
ing : 19 

Critical Essays of a Country Parson 9 

Crooke's Chemical Analysis 16 

Dyeing and Calico Printing 18 

Culley's Handbook of Telegraphy 19 

Cusack's History of Ireland 3 

Davidson's Introduction to NewTestament 22 

Dead Shot (The), by Marksman 26 

Decaisne and Le Maout's Botany 15 

De Morgax'S Budget of Paradoxes 11 

Disraeli's Lord George Bentinck 5 

Novels and Tales 25 

DOBSONonthe Ox 27 

Donkin on Diabetes 17 

Dove on Storms 12 

Doyle's Fairyland 13 

Drew's Reasons of Faith 21 

Eastlake's Hints on Household Taste 19 

Gothic Revival 19 



no 



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Edkn's Queensland 21 

Edwards's Travels in Tyrol ^ 

Elements of Botany • 1; > 

Ellicott'S Commentary onEphesians 22 

„ Galatians 22 

, Pastoral Epist. 22 

Philippians,&o 22 

Thessalonians 22 

Lectures on the Life of Christ... 22 

Epochs of History 4 

ERICHSEN'S Surgery 16 

Evans's Ancient Stone Implements 14 

Ewald'S Antiquities of Israel 21 

History of Israel 22 

Fairbairn's Applications of Iron 20 

Information for Engineers ... 20 

Mills and Millwork 20 

Farrar's Chapters on Language 7 

Families of Speech 7 

Fitzwygram on Horses and Stables 27 

Forsyth's Essays <> 

Fowler's Collieries and Colliers 28 

Francis's Fishing Book 27 

Freeman's Historical Geography of Europe 4 

Freshfield's Travels in the Caucasus 24 

From January to December 15 

Froude's English in Ireland 1 

History of England 1 

Short Studies on Great Subjects 9 

Gamgee on Horse-Shoeing 27 

GANOT'S Elementary Physics 13 

Natural Philosophy 13 

Gardiner's Thirty Years' War 4 

Garrod's Materia Medica 18 

Gilbert's Cadore, or Titian's Country 23 

Gilbert and Churchill's Dolomites 23 

Girdlestone's Bible Synonymes 21 

Goithe's Faust, translated by Hayward ... 25 

Goldsmith's Poems, Illustrated 26 

GOODEVE'S Mechanism 13 

Mechanics 13 

Grant's Ethics of Aristotle 6 

Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson 9 

Gray's Anatomy 17 

Grifein's Algebra and Trigonometry 13 

Griffith's Fundamentals 21 

Sermons for the Times 21 

Grove on Correlation of Physical Forces ... 14 

Gtjyot's Earth and Man ... 14 

Gwilt's Encyclopaedia of Architecture 19 

Harding's Texts and Thoughts 22 

Hare on Election of Representatives 7 

Hartwig'S Harmonies of Nature 15 

Polar World 15 

Sea and its Living Wonders ... 15 

Subterranean World 15 

Tropical World 15 

Haughton'S Animal Mechanics 14 

Hayward's Biographical and Critical 

Essays ; Second and Third Series 4 



Helmhotz's Popular Lectures 13 

Hemsley's Handbook of Trees and Plants 15 

IIkhschel'S Outlines of Astronomy 11 

Hodgson's Theory of Practice 10 

Time and Space 10 

Holland's Recollections 5 

Holmes's System of Surgery 16 

Surgical Diseases of Infancy 16 

HOWITT'S Rural Life of England 21 

Visits to Remarkable Places 24 

IIubner's Memoir of Sixtus V 2 

Hughes's (W.) Manual of Geography 12 

Humboldt's Centenary Biography 5 

Hume's Essays 11 

Treatise on Human Nature 11 

Ihne's Boman History 2 

Ingelow's Poems 26 

Jameson's Saints and Martyrs 18 

Legends of the Madonna 18 

Monastic Orders 18 

Jameson and Eastlake's Saviour 18 

Jenkin's Electricity and Magnetism 13 

Jerram's Lycidas of Milton 26 

Jerrold's Life of Napoleon 4 

Johnston's Geographical Dictionary 12 

Kalisch'S Commentary on the Bible 8 

Keith on Fulfilment of Prophecy 22 

Kenyon, Life of the First Lord 5 

Kerl'S Metallurgy .: 20 

Kirby and Spence's Entomology 15 

Lang's Ballads and Lyrics 26 

Latham's English Dictionary 7 

Laughton's Nautical Surveying 12 

Laverack's Setter 27 

Lawrence on Rocks 14 

Lecky's History of European Morals 3 

Rationalism 3 

Leaders of Public Opinion 5 

Leisure Hours in Town, by A.K.H.B 9 

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